Musings on Digital Identity
The JOSE and COSE HPKE specs, “Use of Hybrid Public Key Encryption (HPKE) with JSON Web Encryption (JWE)” and “Use of Hybrid Public-Key Encryption (HPKE) with CBOR Object Signing and Encryption (COSE)” are continuing to progress towards completion. The JOSE HPKE spec successfully completed its second working group last call (WGLC) in February 2026, received […]
I gave a presentation at the 2026 OAuth Security Workshop in Leipzig describing the actions we took when an actionable security vulnerability was discovered affecting numerous OpenID and OAuth specifications. Much of the information discussed was not previously public. As I described when writing about a spec we created to address the problems, the security […]
Congratulations to Mike Prorock and Orie Steele on the publication of “ML-DSA for JSON Object Signing and Encryption (JOSE) and CBOR Object Signing and Encryption (COSE)” as RFC 9964! This is a major step forward towards enabling widely-available post-quantum signatures for the Internet and devices. The abstract from the RFC is: This document specifies JSON […]
I’m pleased to report that the Final 1.1 OpenID Federation specifications have been published. These meet the demand for cleanly separating the protocol-independent OpenID Federation functionality from the protocol-specific OpenID Federation functionality for OpenID Connect. As I described when these specs were first published, the OpenID Federation 1.0 specification contains two kinds of…
I gave the following presentation on behalf of the OpenID Connect Working Group at the Monday, April 27, 2026 OpenID Workshop at Cisco: OpenID Connect Working Group Update (PowerPoint) (PDF) And as has become traditional, I also gave this invited “101” session presentation at the Internet Identity Workshop (IIW) on Tuesday, April 28, 2026: Introduction […]
I gave the presentation “The Journey to OpenID Federation 1.0 and the Road Ahead” at the 4th International Workshop on Trends in Digital Identity (TDI 2026) in Verona, Italy. My talk abstract was: The OpenID Federation 1.0 specification was completed in February 2026 after a 9½ year journey, starting with the challenge from Lucy Lynch […]
I gave the presentation “The Post-Quantum Apocalypse Is Already Upon Us” at the 4th International Workshop on Trends in Digital Identity (TDI 2026) in Verona, Italy. My talk abstract was: “The future is already here — it’s just not evenly distributed” is an apt description of the impact of quantum computers on cryptography and its […]
The FIDO Alliance has published the CTAP 2.3 Specification. No breaking changes were introduced between CTAP 2.2 and CTAP 2.3. Implementations of CTAP 2.2 are thus conformant to CTAP 2.3, therefore, a decision was made to provide certification of CTAP 2.3 implementations and not have a separate certification category for CTAP 2.2 implementations. These are […]
The OpenID Connect Relying Party Metadata Choices 1.0 specification has been approved as a Final Specification by the OpenID Foundation membership. The declarations enabled by this specification give an OpenID Provider the information needed to successfully interact with a Relying Party that has not previously registered with it. As I wrote when this became an […]
The final OpenID Federation 1.0 specification was published today. This marks the end of a nearly decade-long journey and the beginning of new ones. At the 2016 TNC conference, Lucy Lynch challenged Roland Hedberg, saying “If there is someone who should be able to bring the eduGAIN identity federation into the new world of OpenID […]
Implementers of OpenID Federation gathered at the 2026 Trust and Internet Identity Meeting Europe (TIIME) unconference in Amsterdam on Friday, February 13, 2026 to test their implementations with one another. 12 people with 9 implementations and from 9 countries performed interop tests together. Participants were from Croatia, Finland, Greece, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Serbia, Sweden, and […]
I had the pleasure of presenting an overview of OpenID Federation during the 2026 Trust and Internet Identity Meeting Europe (TIIME) unconference in Amsterdam. It was the opening talk in a day dedicated to OpenID Federation – Friday, February 13, 2026. There were ~90 practitioners in attendance. They asked great practical questions, including about how […]
The OpenID Federation 1.0 specification contains two kinds of functionality: Protocol-independent federation functionality used for establishing trust and applying policies in multilateral federations, and Protocol-specific federation functionality that can be used by OpenID Connect and OAuth 2.0 deployments to apply the protocol-independent federation functionality. At the urging of implementers…
The “Use of Hybrid Public-Key Encryption (HPKE) with CBOR Object Signing and Encryption (COSE)” specification has been updated to align with pertinent changes recently applied to the JOSE HPKE specification. Changes in draft 19 are: Utilize distinct algorithm identifiers for the use of HPKE for Integrated Encryption and HPKE for Key Encryption. Adds HPKE-7 algorithms. […]
I was encouraged by Pål Axelsson to hold an unconference discussion giving an overview of OpenID Federation during the 2025 Internet2 Technology Exchange conference in Denver. So I did so with a receptive and engaged group of participants yesterday, Thursday, December 11, 2025. See the notes from the Thursday session by Phil Smart, which include […]
I am my wife Becky’s password manager. I keep all of her passwords (and mine) in an encrypted Excel spreadsheet – something I’ve done since before password manager applications existed. Yesterday I had reason to log into her Amazon account to help her place an order for puppy food and encountered a surprise. The password […]
The OpenID Federation 1.0 specification has started its 60-day review to become an OpenID Final Specification. Draft 46 of the specification, which was published today, is the target of the 60-day review. Thanks to all who participated in the Working Group Last Call (WGLC) review, which was based on Draft 45. Your feedback resulted in […]
A design team formed and met after the JOSE working group meeting at IETF 124 in Montreal to discuss possible next steps for the JOSE HPKE specification. As recorded in the PR applying the decisions made, the design team produced these recommendations: Not use "enc" when performing Integrated Encryption. Define one new Key Management Mode […]
Today the OpenID Connect Working Group started a two-week Working Group Last Call (WGLC) for the OpenID Federation 1.0 specification. During the two weeks ending on December 4, 2025, working group members will identify any issues that they believe should be addressed before it becomes final. Of course, responses of the form “It’s ready to […]
The “Fully-Specified Algorithms for JSON Object Signing and Encryption (JOSE) and CBOR Object Signing and Encryption (COSE)” specification has been published as RFC 9864! I believe that this is the first RFC I’ve worked on that started its journey as a presentation of an idea to the working group without an accompanying draft. The idea […]