Managing your identity in the Internet of 2006 is a complex Web that requires multiple identities and passwords for multiple sites and services. This open source effort led by Novell aims to integrate disparate identity standards and projects in an effort to help create an identity system that spans the Internet. “Formerly announced Monday, Bandit actually went live in February. Bandit integrates a number of different initiatives and open standards to identity management. Among them is an implementation of the open source Higgins framework which is seen as an open source affront to Microsoft’s InfoCard single sign initiative.
Project Higgins is an effort in which Novell, IBM and other collaborate on an identity framework that enables users to integrate profile and identity information across disparate systems. Other Bandit components include The Common Authentication Services Adapter (CASA), which enables interoperable authentication for sign-on systems, and the Role Engine service for role-based authorization.