This is my second Axiom of Identity, which builds upon the
first. I swear that if you grok these, you’ll see the model that
I am creating that allows for the creation of powerful identity
management solutions. I believe that it is important to remember
that we are living in a world with so much identity around us, that we
fail to realize where it all came from. On to Axiom #2:

I posit that identity does not exist outside the context of a community.

Once again, it is easy to fall into the trap of believing that I have
inherent identity, and that it is mine. However The First Axiom
of Identity builds the foundation that all of my identity is given to
me by others. If this is the case, then that identity can only
exist, and be understood, by the community that gave me that identity, or other communities that are related.

The root of the Second Axiom is that identity is built upon language and
communications. Since attributes of identity are descriptive in
nature, they are dependant upon accurate and consistent definitions of
those attributes. It is often difficult to see this clearly since
much of what we are looking at with identity was learned when we were
children. Some of our attributes are so commonly understood
within our communities, that we fail to see them distinctly.

For example, we all know what height, weight, age, hair color, and shoe
size are. What we forget is that there are still communities on
earth that would not understand our measurements of these attributes
… let alone the name of the attribute! We can assume that
almost any culture on earth has the concept
of weight, and has some word they assign to it. We can not assume
that they measure their concept of weight in a unit of measurement that
we would understand. I happen to be well versed in ‘pounds’ since
I was raised in the United States. In the UK someone might
actually still give me their weight in ‘stone‘.

Although there is considerable efforts in global standards, these
standards are only beginning to scratch the surface of a common
language for identity attributes, and a common set of metrics for these
attributes. Until the standards grow to encompass all of identity
(yeah … and when will that be?) we have to understand that identity
attributes must be related to a community, and the standard by which it
is measured.

So where does this fit in the software realm? It simply means
that as we create a ‘schema’ for identity, we have to keep track of the
‘context’ of that information. Two core pieces of information
that we have to track when creating an identity management solution
include “Who is the definitive source of that identity attribute?”, and
“Who is the authority on the metrics of that identity attribute?”
These might be different, or the same, communities. Using the
example of weight, the definitive source of the information could be my
home scale, a doctor, or a hospital that I visited. The metric of ‘pounds’
in the United States, however, is governed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
Again, the importance of this is when a person or company wants my
identity, they also will want to ensure they trust the definitive
source, and the metrics that I provide. (I am sure that the new Virgin Galactic
space flights are not going to trust my home scale as a definitive
source of my weight!) Another example of this is that your bank,
when you apply for a car loan, still wants to check with the definitive
source of your employment information. And they are going to want
to hear your salary in units of measurement that they know!

Some new issues arise as we dig deeper into this model. First, we
have to be ready to resolve conflicts in naming of identity
attributes. Second, we have to be ready to provide translations
between units of measurement. Third, we have to have mechanisms
to verify identity information with the definitive sources.

All of these are subjects that I’ll touch on in other Axioms …

When I first read this summary, I was thinking along a completely
diffferent path.  This article has some good points, however as
usual it seems to focus on the people who are using identity
information outside of the control or involvement of the end-user.

As a side note, this reminded me to document some of the current
limitations in directory technologies that I believe are continuing to
hinder directory-based identity solutions.  Two of these
limitations are:

• Directories lack temporal versioning of attribute information and
  values.  If you consider identity of a person over time, there are
  numerous attributes that will change and evolve with that person as
  they grow and proceed through life.  So height, weight, income,
  home address, employer … all of these are attributes that change at
  various rates.  A directory must have the ability to record the
  changes allowing a persons identity to be viewed as of any date/time in
  history.  An example of where this becomes powerful is for when we
  are asked for our three previous jobs, or prior addresses.
• Directories also lack attribute aliasing.  We all have
  identity attributes that are given different names in different
  communities … but they all point to the same identity
  attribute.  This could be as simple as the attribute name in
  different languages, to completely different words or references that
  point to the same attribute:  Salary vs. Annual Income

Anyhow … I still do like using directories … they just have to evolve forward to contain some additional capabilities.

Identity: Find it before federating it.
These Avanade consultants say identity federation has merit, but it’s
not a panacea for fixing problems with identity complexity. [Computerworld Software News]

In the beginning, there was … well … what was there? This is
the first of several posts that I am going to write, that outline some
of my thinking and research into digital identity. So to get
things going:

I posit that we humans do not have any inherent identity.

What? Are you kidding? Of course I have identity!
Well … like what? Age? Height? Salary? Credit
Information? The key is to recognize that none of these are
inherent to you … they are all given to you by outside
entities. All of them.

If we carefully examine the definition of “identity” we’ll see that the roots of the word is from Latin:

Etymology: Middle French identité, from Late Latin identitat-,
identitas, probably from Latin identidem repeatedly, contraction of
idem et idem, literally, same and same
1 a : sameness of
essential or generic character in different instances b : sameness
in all that constitutes the objective reality of a thing

Consider the possibility that “identity” is really a community saying
that we are “the same as something else”. Our height is the same
as something we call “six feet”. Our age is the same as something
we call “40 years”. Our salary is the same as something we call
“$150,000”. Identity becomes a completely relative thing.
Relative to a community that we belong to. And identity is completely based on language.

To reinforce this, consider that all of your individual pieces of
identity – all of your attributes – only exist within the context of
the community that gave you the attribute. If you have a US
Social Security number, it means nothing in the jungles of New
Zealand. If you weigh 150 pounds., then it only means something
in a community that understands what a pound is. And my credit
history, or work history? Again, these are only valid in a
community context that understands what these are, and that knows the entities
that gave them to me. This is actually the basis for the “Second Axiom of Identity”.

What is so important about this First Axiom? It is that we
gather identity about ourselves throughout our lives. Our
“identity” actually starts before we are born, since our parents and doctors begin
the process of describing us and creating the “same as” stories.
(e.g. he kicked alot, was our second, etc.) On top of that, our
identity continues to grow even after we die. Our death
certificate, the details of our funeral, and the results of our
will. We might even get into a Hall of Fame, or gain other such
tributes after death. We accumulate identity from before we are
born, throughout our lives, and even after we die. And there are
a lot of people and companies that want that accumulated
information. What is interesting is that there is no software
solution for a person to easily accumulate their identity.

Most efforts in digital identity management have taken the tack of
controlling the dissemination of our identity … but few have had a
focus on how to accumulate our identity. When I was working on
the digitalMe project at Novell, I realized that core to digital
identity management is our own ability to accumulate our identity
information as it is given to us. Only when we have accumulated
it, can we choose who to share it with. Only when we accept that
we have no inherent identity can we build the systems to accumulate it
from scratch.

I like the direction that Kim is taking with his “Law’s of Identity”.
I had started a list a while ago of my “Axioms of Identity” … I’m
going to dig them up and elaborate on them. They actually will
dovetail nicely with what Kim is creating.

With his first law, Kim covers “The Owner Decides …”
which is common sense to those in the space. There are, however,
some complexities to this scenario. I agree with it, but there
are deep assumptions that we operate on top of … many of which I
would suggest are false. We just don’t see it in everyday life.

I believe that if we look deeper into what “identity” is, and where it
comes from, we are able to build much more powerful models to develop
software around. If we operate from an incomplete model, we’ll
always end up dealing with inconsistancies … and these are the
indications of the incomplete model. The most important thing is
to study and understand the language that we use … all identity comes
from communication. I love language and words …

I’ll see if I can post my “First Axiom of Identity” tonight … I’ve
got a couple of things going on, but the kids are almost in bed.
😉

Also … I like “The Owner Chooses” better than “The Owner Decides” …
purely from an empowerment perspective. If we look at the roots of the word “decide”
we’ll see that it really means “to cut off” … to take a path by
“cutting off” all others. To go in a direction after “killing
off” all alternatives.

Choice is defined as “to select freely and after consideration” … a much more empowering perspective … IMHO. I know … some will say nit-picking,
however I believe in the power that language has over us … and feel
that we often limit ourselves using less powerful words. If you
want to hear others in science talk about this … go see the movie “What the BLEEP do we know!?”

P.S. I look forward to talking more with Dave Kearns about Identity and Persona.
It seems to me that Persona is the “social facade” that we create …
the story that we have about ourselves. To me, Identity is more
the “sameness in all that constitutes the objective reality of a
thing”. More on this in my Axioms …