Microsoft pledges support for OpenID
675808
(InfoWorld) - Microsoft Corp. has thrown its weight behind OpenID, an emerging Web authentication standard. The announcement was made Tuesday atÂ the RSA Conference in San Francisco during a joint keynote by Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates and Chief Research and Strategy Officer Craig Mundie that was long on vision and short on specifics. Microsoft pledged to work to integrate OpenID with its CardSpace identity management software, which is now available in conjunction with Windows Vista. "The marriage of CardSpace and OpenID 2.0 is actually a giant step forward," Mundie said. By integrating these two technologies, Microsoft expects to "eliminate the issue of the man-in-the-middle-attack," Mundie said. In these attacks, which are increasingly being used by phishers, a thief steals sensitive information by setting up a fake Web site that passes information back and forth between the victim and the legitimate Web site. OpenID is an emerging open-source standard that simplifies the task of logging on to many different Web sites. Gates and Mundie spent much of their keynote discussing how their company plans to simplify security and make the process of managing digital identities easier. IT professionals could achieve both ends by getting rid of log-in passwords and replacing them with strong, certificate-based authentication techniques like smart cards, Gates said. "Passwords are not only weak. Passwords have a huge problem. If you get more and more of them, the worse it is," he said. "We see smart cards ... [and] certificates in general as the way these things should go. You'll be presenting certificates as opposed to weak passwords," he said. Microsoft hopes to drive the adoption of smart cards, with the launch of its Identity Lifecycle Manager 2007, introduced at RSA. Expected to ship on May 1, this software integrates technology from Microsoft's 2005 acquisition of Alacris with the company's Identity Integration Server. The software will make it easier for users to integrate strong authentication technologies like smart cards into Microsoft networks. Mundie suggested that in order for security to work, technology companies will need to turn their thinking upside down, to a certain extent. "Security was really a blocking thing," Mundie said. "How do you invert this ... so these security mechanisms become a thing that makes it simpler for anyone to be granted permission to get [network] access." Microsoft plans to achieve this by switching the focus using technologies like IPsec (Internet Protocol security) and IPv6 (IP version 6), Mundie said. The company has already been using these technologies for the past two and a half years in an internal access control system that is better about granting employees and contractors access to the data and applications that they need, but keeping them away from the rest of the network, he said. With breaches being reported every week -- often after the loss of a laptop computer -- companies need to think beyond locking down the perimeter of their networks, Mundie added. "The threat model is changing in fundamental ways. We could continue to invest in this fortress mentality of protecting everything, but I don't think that would be sufficient," he said. "Our castle is fairly porous because a lot of our assets leave the castle." Microsoft's broad vision did not impress one attendee. "This was the most content-free presentation I've seen at RSA in years," said Bruce Schneier, chief technology officer with BT Group PLC's Counterpane unit. "My guess is that most people in the room could have given that talk because it's where we all want to go." The keynote, in which Gates and his successor sat side-by-side and, at times, finished each others thoughts, appeared to be a symbolic handing over of power, Schneier said. Gates will be stepping down from his day-to-day duties in July 2008, at which point Mundie will take over Microsoft's research efforts. But Schneier doesn't expect Gates to appear at next year's conference. "The take-away is Craig's coming back next year, but Bill isn't," he said.
535487
SEPTEMBER 16, 2004 (IDG NEWS SERVICE) - Microsoft Corp. yesterday said it is looking to work more closely with developers of the Open Office open-source project.
20965
Yahoo may soon launch OpenID, a Web standard that relieves people of the need to remember multiple passwords to log into different Web sites.
429195
Unified support for passwords, smart cards and tokens means better network security, the company says.
475065
A new product from Microsoft Corp.&#39;s hardware group aims to eliminate the need for that not-so-secret list of user names and passwords hidden in the typical desk drawer.
266555
IBM, Google, Microsoft, Verisign, and Yahoo have joined the OpenID Foundation board.
560555
Microsoft officials said today that they have revised their Sender ID protocol to work better with an existing standard and that they have narrowed their patent application to make sure it doesn't cover other proposals.
7619
IBM, Google, Microsoft, Verisign and Yahoo have joined the corporate board of the OpenID Foundation, giving a boost to the groupâs efforts to simplify the process of signing into Web sites.
130533
Microsoft Corp. said on Sunday that it would share the underlying software code for its Office program as part of its efforts to make governments more confident in the security and compatibility
202350
ALTHOUGH Microsoft&#39;s anti-spam sender-ID is disliked by Open Sources, it is providing popular with the very people it is targeted against.
380342
Microsoft Corp. said on Sunday that it  would share the underlying software code for its Office program  as part of its efforts to make governments more confident in  the security and compatibility of the world's largest software  maker's products.
721100
UPDATED - In another carefully timed move to garner support for its document format still under consideration for an international standard, Microsoft today clarified the terms under which use of its Office Open XML format by developers is permitted.
262417
Is Open ID the glue we need? Microsoft isn't the only one taking an interest in Open ID. AOL, Yahoo! and Digg have all announced they'll accept Open ID credentials as a way of identifying users online.â¦
236332
InfoWorld - IBM, Google, Microsoft, Verisign, and Yahoo have joined the corporate board of theÂ OpenID Foundation, giving a boost to the group's efforts to simplify the process of signing into Web sites.
161623
Identity 2.0 company Sxip releases a new login and password management
79083
MacCentral - Two prominent open-source software groups have rejected a proposed technology standard backed by Microsoft Corp. that would close a loophole used to send unsolicited commercial ("spam") e-mail, citing unresolved patent and licensing issues with the standard known as Sender ID.
20119
(InfoWorld) - Microsoft says it will focus on four key areas to improve interoperability between its own software and other vendors' products. Senior Microsoft representatives met with InfoWorld on Thursday to highlight identity management; Web services and related development; collaboration between information workers and system management comprise the new interoperability focus. "We are really working on new protocols in the WS-* [spoken as Web services star] space that enable interoperability across identity systems," said Jean Paoli, Microsoftâs general manager of interoperability and XML architecture. Lat week, Microsoft vowed to integrate its CardSpace identity management system with the OpenID Web authentication standard. Paoli emphasized the move as evidence of the commitment. WS-* represents a series of Web services-related specifications for standardization in areas such as security and messaging. A lot of the issues Microsoft has in interoperability tend to fall into these four categories, said Tom Robertson, the companyâs general manager of interoperability and standards. "Those are the four areas that we're hearing about now," as needing attention, Paoli said. "It doesn't mean the list is closed." Microsoft's identity management push, however, apparently will not be centered on its previous Passport initiative for Internet security.Â  "I've not been hearing about Passport in so long," Paoli said. Microsoft plans to be creative in addressing interoperability, using a host of tools at its disposal. "It's going to mean making IP available in a range of ways," Robertson said. The company already has dabbled in open source as a way to boost interoperability, offering a bridge between the OpenDocument Format (ODF) and Microsoft's Open XML electronic document formats, said Robertson. Paoli and Robertson listed multiple Microsoft interoperability projects in the past several years, such as its work with Novell on interoperability between Windows and Novell's Suse Linux. The company's interoperability effort with Sun Microsystems also was noted. But they remained upset with IBM for what Microsoft perceives are IBM efforts to block Open XML from becoming approved as a standard by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). The two co-authored an open letter this week entitled "Interoperability, Choice and Open XML," that pointed fingers of blame at IBM. "The open letter is an effort to clearly articulate what Microsoft is trying to do," Robertson said. It is important to shine a light on what IBM is doing to block Open XML and block choice, he added. In response, an IBM representative pointed to the ConsortiumInfo.org Standards Blog, which states there is "significant commercial opposition" to Microsoft's electronic document proposal. Microsoft made a "bad bet " that ODF would fail in the marketplace, the blog stated.