Identity Management is on the change. It will never be the same again. It is already more than Employee IAM. The segregation between various parts of IAM is blurring. Digital business require advanced identity services, well beyond the human identities. Identity Fabrics are the model for your Future IAM. They are about a consistent set of capabilities and services in a modern architecture, supporting your business and IT use cases. They deliver the Identity Services for your new digital services, ready-to-use and supporting the time-to-value in the digital transformation of your business. However, they also provide a path for modernizing and consolidating your legacy IAM into a modern set of IAM services, at your own pace. Thus, Identity Fabrics enable your IAM expansion and transition. Martin Kuppinger will explain the fundamental concepts of Identity Fabrics and explain why these are the cornerstone of forward-looking IAM strategies.
In context of the continuously growing degree of digitization, the sub-sector of strong identification and authentication of private and legal persons is increasingly being transferred to the digital world. An exponentially growing, cross-industry market potential of digital identity management is evident.
New segments of significant market relevance based on strong identification / authentication are emerging, such as e-health, Internet of Things and smart cities. Within existing industries of sensitive customer identities (e.g. banking, insurance), the possibility of comprehensive, compliance and security conformable digitalization of regulated identity verification processes arise.
The exponentially growing market potential of digital identities is underpinned by the regulatory and catalytic influence of the European Parliament and Council in form of the eIDAS (electronic identification, authentication and trust services) Regulation (EU) No. 910/2014. This allegation repeals the Signature Directive 1999/93/EC and promotes the removal of digital barriers for Europe-wide citizen identification in the field of public services in form of establishing inter-state interoperability. Hereby the European market potential of digital use cases based on strong customer identification / authentication should be raised
Globally operating, technology-driven and cross-industry oriented platforms are predestinated to drive the market for digital identity management systems based on an already significant customer base
In this context Apple recognized the prospective market potential of the digital identity market and focuses on positioning themselves as digital identity provider. On one hand side Near Field Communication (NFC) is partially accessible for third party applications since iOS 13 in order to e.g. read out the German identity card based on the eID functionality, on the other hand side Apple announced the CryptoKit at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference 2019 for possible establishment of hardware-based wallets as a prerequisite for the secure, local storage of digital identity information. Furthermore, Apple published the Apple login functionality as a primary authentication option and presented two patents for the secure storage and reuse of identity information (Identity Credential Verification Techniques - Pub. No. 20190325125, 20190327228). These patents are structured along the sub-areas of secure creation, storage and transmission of digital identity information based on driving license and ID card as official identity document. Hereby the required components for a comprehensive identity management system in form of strong identity validation, local data storage and downstream authentication could be combined.
Based on announced Apple strategy, use cases of recurring digital validation, e.g. in the form of video identification, and thus the main business area of current market participants of digital identity validation is no longer applicable. In order the maintain market relevance, considering increasing availability of re-usable, digital identities, a shift to value-added services (e.g. KYC processes, company identities, sanction / PEP checks) required.
As the identity stored on the secure element can be derived from an initial check of official identity document (e.g. ID card, passport), but also from existing sources of already verified identities, the market relevance of further companies storing sensitive customer identities (e.g. banks, insurance companies) should be considered in respect to the short-term realization of the Apple / Google strategy orientation. Due to the medium-term reuse of already stored identities on the mobile device and the possibility of initial customer verification in cooperation with established identification service providers, the window of opportunity for active market participation by the financial and insurance sector is closing. In order to avoid direct market displacement and ensure medium-term participation in the digital identity market, identity holding companies should define a proactive, platform-driven market strategy in cooperation with international technology service providers.
The medium-term comprehensive digitalization of sensitive identity information utilizing customer-centric, device-based data storage concept and convenient reuse without the need for re-identification has a disruptive effect on the current market. Current strategic orientations of the public and private sector need to be recalibrated to avoid potential displacement from the exponentially growing and highly profitable identity market. In this context, it will be crucial to define pro-active cooperation models with global technology providers or shift business models towards comprehensive value-added services.
