Identity Management
Identity management (IDM) at NC State is a broad area that deals with identifying individuals and their relationships to the university. For example, an individual may have a relationship with the university as a faculty member, another relationship with the university as a parking permit holder, and yet another relationship as an alumnus.
IDM systems refer to those things like "faculty member," "parking permit holder," and "alumnus" as attributes, and an individual is known to the university by his or her total collection of attributes. You can see Professor Sam Seuss' collection of attributes below.
Ultimately, the attributes of an individual govern what services, systems or features an individual can access. For example, an individual with a faculty member attribute would get access to the "For Faculty and Staff" section of MyPack Portal, an individual with a parking permit holder attribute would be authorized to park on campus, and an individual with an alumnus attribute would be eligible to join the NC State Alumni Association.
Thus, identity management is an information technology solution used to solve university business process challenges benefiting all colleges and units at NC State.
Identity management benefits to the university
IDM at NC State will:
- Improve security and privacy by sharing only what is necessary about an individual only when it is necessary
- Provide "one version of the truth" from various sources
- A single, authoritative access point for identity data
- Simplified administration by eliminating the maintenance of distinct identities for separate resources
- Streamline deployment of new university processes, because the identity will already be in place
- Allow efficient sharing of resources within and beyond the university
Sample of a fictional professor's potential identity attributes
Identity Management Team members and operational pages
Every college and unit in the university has a stake in identity management as it cannot be developed without a collaborative effort to identify what attributes of identity are important in all business processes used at NC State, and in ensuring that everyone is using a common definition of those identity attributes.
Four OIT staff members have formed an Identity Management Team to facilitate this collaboration across the university. For team member information, visit the team operational page. For agendas and minutes of Identity Management meetings, visit the meetings operational page. And for documents associated with the program, visit the documents operational page.
Current efforts
- Replacing the aging infrastructure that will be used to support identity management - By December 2012
- Engaging with campus - Ongoing
- Level-setting on identity management concepts and terminology
- Identifying business processes being used and identity attributes associated with those processes
- Gathering information on pain points and areas of improvement that identity management might help solve
- Working with OIT units and IT Governance to review and prioritize efforts
- Oracle Identity Management Application Suite Phase I - By December 2012
- Four major areas confirmed: account provisioning/deprovisioning, password management, initial work on guest system, and small-scale grouping
- Potential new features based on attributes and business processes identified
- Oracle Identity Management Application Suite Phase II - By June 2013
- Prioritized based on input from the colleges and the units, and from the IDM Working Group, a subteam of the Infrastructure Subcommittee of the IT Governance @ NC State
Historical perspective
For any other information about the identity management at NC State, contact any of the team members.