Georgia State University: Building an Identity Management Infrastructure for the eUniversity

Abstract

Georgia State University is enabling the eUniversity - the system of basic communications and transactional services that characterize the electronic, next generation institution of higher education. Enabling this identity management vision requires a complex architecture of inter-working technical and policy components to manage individuals' electronic identities, secure authentication processes, and access authorization to campus services. The research and education environment of the 21st century must provide the ability for on-campus and remote students to take courses, for faculty to collaborate with partners at distant sites, for researchers to conduct research with distributed investigator teams, and for administrative services to span the reaches of the global cyberspace.
In February of 2000, Georgia State began working on this eUniversity and the electronic infrastructure to support it. A new group, named Advanced Computing Services (ACS), was formed and charged to investigate, design and work collaboratively to implement this new infrastructure. ACS was mindful that the identity management infrastructure should conform to best practices and standards to ensure effective interoperation with the higher-education community. Their new identity management system soon reflected the model of the NMIEDIT Consortium recommendations, including the Internet2 Middleware Initiative directory schemas, software components, best practice papers, and policy recommendations.
Georgia State's participation since May 2002 in the NMI Integration Testbed program served to further inform the process. Georgia State's identity management solution is being achieved through working with the campus stakeholders to define requirements, data and business flow, synchronization procedures, and core applications supported by the identity management infrastructure. Along the way, they used a communications strategy for developing project acceptance and keeping the campus informed.
As this case study shows, a number of lessons were learned regarding the data and policy of identity management, the technical infrastructure solutions available, and also the institutional benefits in the establishment of new relationships and business processes of identity management to support the emerging eUniversity at Georgia State.