Everything About Digital Identity Management

Do you remember the famous Men In Black? Yes, the same organization that made us believe that life from outside the Earth coexists on Earth. The movies amazed us with spaceships, aliens and a secret organization that keeps track of every alien activity on Earth. If you remember all this, then you might also remember that to keep the organization in the shadows, they would erase any memory of the previous lives of their recruited Agents and restore it after their retirement. Also, to keep the world a safer place to live for every creature, the organization managed the identity of extraterrestrials. They achieved this by keeping the data of every creature, from the time they landed on the Earth throughout their stay. The organization also assigned a particular identity to these aliens to help them gel with the humans. Not only aliens, but their agents also have unique identities. Sounds like a real complex job, right?

Well, it is a tough job for any business to manage the identity of its employees, associates and consultants. We are talking about digital identities here, which are unique identifiers associated with an individual, organization or electronic device in cyberspace. To help you with the hassle of managing various digital identities, we present Digital Identity Management. Want to know more about it? Let’s head on to the next section to know what it holds for you.
 

What Is Digital Identity Management?

Now that we know about Digital Identity Management, let’s look at its origin in the next section.
 

A Step Back In Time – History Of Digital Identity Management

It all started back in 1853 when birth registration was made mandatory (way before MIB was born!). By 1902, this practice was standardized in the US. Did you know that data related to birth was recorded in church registers before being a standard? Well, it must have been cumbersome to maintain such records. Anyways, the following year, Missouri and Massachusetts became the first states to issue to have a driver’s license to operate a car. A few years later, the League of Nations, an intergovernmental organization, championed global passport standards in the aftermath of the First World War.

In 1935, the US Social Security Act was signed, encouraging many countries to adopt this trend for tax reasons or as a general national ID number. Fernando Corbató introduced digital IDs and passwords to keep individual files private almost three decades later. The aim was to protect sensitive information within a network being used by multiple individuals. In 1990, with the advent of the commercial internet, traditional Digital Identity Management was adapted for online applications. However, due to high maintenance costs and security issues, the identity management stack was born in 2000. This resolved the security issue but high maintenance costs still limited its deployment. Thus, in 2010, Identity-as-a-Service (IDAAS) cloud was introduced, which focused on simplification, automation and reduced cost.

The adoption of cloud services in recent years has enhanced data breaches rapidly. Hence, Digital Identity Management will need to evolve, just as MIB did to fulfill the hour's need.

After tracing its history, let’s learn about its working in the next section!
 

Working Of Digital Identity Management

Now that you know the working, allow us to guide you through the real-life application of Digital Identity Management in the next section.
 

Application Of Digital Identity Management In Real Life

There are things out there that you need to know. By “things” we mean real-life applications of Digital Identity Management. Without further ado, let’s read:
 

• Online Authentication

  It allows secure and convenient access to e-services. For instance, you can access a service using a smart identity card or a mobile phone with a registered phone number using a unique digital identity.

• Digital Signature

  In the EU and other jurisdictions, digital signatures based on strong encryption are considered to be legally equivalent to handwritten signatures. Contracts, transactions, and even multimedia call all be signed and time-stamped

• Physical Access

  You can control physical access to public transportation, events, or buildings.

• Record Keeping

  It's no hidden fact that digital transactions leave a trail. A record of digital transactions can be used to improve government and private sector accountability and transparency, as well as to facilitate decision-making.

It’s time to learn about of the benefits of Digital Identity Management in the next section.
 

Benefits Of Digital Identity Management

We all know the benefits of having the MIB. After all, if it had not been for MIB, then who would have saved us from extra-terrestrial creatures such as Boris the Animal? Although, the benefits of Digital Identity Management are much more than that of MIB:
 

• Streamline User Experience

  With SSO-based (single sign-on) identity management, Digital Identity Management eliminates the need to enter numerous authentication information. You can access your company’s data and services with just one login account and password. Incredible, isn’t it?

• Improving Security And Enhancing Data Privacy:

  Proper Digital Identity Management can significantly improve the security and privacy of your IT infrastructure by restricting unauthorized user access.

• Enhancing Efficiency

  Having your digital data saved under one organized folder can greatly boost operational efficiency.

• Simplify Reporting And Auditing

  Any security breach or data loss can be easily documented as all the data is stored under one folder. (Remember point 3?) User credentials can be easily collected from the Digital Identity Management repository when auditing is required, making the task even easier.

• Global Access

  With Digital Identity Management, employers and users can access company data from anywhere in the world, anytime, by completing a simple login step.

Fifteen hundred years ago, everybody knew the Earth was the center of the universe. Five hundred years ago, everybody knew the Earth was flat and before watching MIB, you knew that humans were alone on this planet. Imagine what you’ll know tomorrow. This quote from MIB is our way of saying that the future is still a mystery; however, the future of Digital Identity Management can be predicted in the next section. Let’s reveal it!
 

Future Of Digital Identity Management

Have you ever realized that today, almost all our digital identities are connected through devices, applications and services? Not only this but service providers also control these digital identities and their digital identity data. Having a centralized identity system makes user identity data extremely vulnerable to cyber-attacks and privacy breaches that seriously affect their professional and personal lives. Apart from this, users may find it difficult to manage their personal data or revoke access to their information if multiple third parties or service providers access their information from different applications.

Worry not! Decentralized identity solutions will change the present of Digital Identity Management. It will provide a fresh approach to identity and protect personal data by enabling users and service providers to have more control over their identities and personal data. Additionally, it will provide identity management services to users who can generate and control their digital identity without relying on a specific service provider. Moreover, the security of information will rely on blockchain, as it will enable decentralized storage of digital identity and tokens. #TheFutureIsHere
 

To Sum Up

Technology has always played a crucial role in any development, be it in MIB or the sphere of identity management. It is believed that technology and innovations in the MIB organization as well as in Digital Identity Management will continue to evolve, making the management of customer identity even more critical for businesses. Digital IDs are at the core of customer-facing initiatives for brands. By establishing relationships with their customers individually, they can build ever-lasting engagement, which was not possible before!