Network Identity and Access Management

I originally wrote this entry on August 6, 2004 and published it on blogs.sun.com.

When Network Computing magazine starts to roll out the carpet for network identity and access management, one should conclude that the market is finally noticing the importance of network identity and access technologies.

Nevertheless, we can still wonder why it took so long for the world to realize the significance of what Sun had been saying for years. (After all, the Liberty Project has been around for a long time.)

Network identity and access management is a fundamental technology for mobile and enterprise environments where sophisticated, aggregated value-add services are integrated from a set of distinct business and functional entities.

The initial market delay could probably be attributed, at least in some part, to the initial wavering by some big ISV's which later melted away as large customers demand for the technology became more and more obvious. As the mobile world became set to go with network identity and access management technologies, some of the traditional technology providers who were sitting on the sidelines became much more active. All of the major IT companies are now active in the Liberty Project.

Note: Thanks for the comments on this post. Originally, I had stated some of the material in the last paragraph, most incorrectly, in the present tense. I've tried to make some necessary corrections on the post to fix these.