InCommon Federation Discussions About Online Student Services

[Ann West <>]

Good afternoon, InCommon Student Members,

Even though a lot has been going on lately with the remote identity proofing 
survey, tomorrow's call has been canceled. Our next call will be held on 
November 12 at 3:00 pm ET and led by Mark McConahay. Please read on for a 
summary of work done on so far since we last met:

Remote Proofing Survey
----------------------
We've had over 100 institutions respond to the remote proofing survey. As a 
reminder, we just asked schools to respond about the distance programs that 
result in awarding academic credentials, thinking that these organizations 
might have higher interest in and thus tighter processes for establishing 
student identity remotely. 

On the surface, the results indicate that very few institutions either do 
identity proofing or know what it is. To promote the survey, we (Mark M, 
Renee S, and Ann) discussed this topic at AACRAO Tech and the EDUCAUSE Annual 
Conferences. At both meetings, there seemed to be a lot of confusion about 
the definition of and the process and need for remote identity proofing. This 
goes for both student services and IT (including security) staff. I think 
Keith Hazelton summed up the understanding gap the best when preparing for 
our session at Internet2 next week:

"The process by which you link the physical person to his/her identity 
information *and* to his/her credential is critical. If this is done poorly, 
there is little or no assurance that the person using that credential to 
authenticate and access services and information is who you believe them to 
be. It could be anyone, or multiple people over time. If this linking is 
weak, even the most complete personal information and the strongest 
credential will not improve the assurance of identity."

It seems like the community needs some clear thought on this critical 
on-boarding issue in addition to suggested practices.

On the November 12th call, Mark M will lead the first discussion on the 
survey results, our possible recommendations, and a process we could use to 
draft our recommendations. 

I hope you can join him on the call.

Best regards,
Ann


-- 
Ann West, Sr. Program Manager 
Internet2/InCommon/Michigan Tech 

 

 
office: +1.906.487.1726