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diff --git a/_posts/yet-another-on-identity.rst b/_posts/yet-another-on-identity.rst new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f83a481 --- /dev/null +++ b/_posts/yet-another-on-identity.rst @@ -0,0 +1,62 @@ +title: Yet another on identity +categories: + - computer + - identity + - Own cloud + - privacy +date: 2012-08-08T00:31:05 +tags: +--- + +I am not sure I have written it somewhere here, but I have been +persuaded that identity is the most important and yet unresolvable issue +circling around Internet `since at least 1997`_ (don’t bother to read +the paper, it is pretty poorly written and I didn’t have courage to +state my conclusions clearly). The paper was about legal aspects of +EDI_ (if you know what it is, then you are probably in 0. 00001 % of +population), but during the research I found that whole idea of +Internet-wide EDI is basically dead not because of technological +challenges (they are real, but probably solvable), but because of lack +of universal government-backed legally binding identity system, and such +system will be never be introduced, while `electorate of some +countries`_ opposes any attempt to introduce any `system of IDs`_. Of +course, I don’t want to say that USA is the only country opposing +identity documents, that they don’t have good reasons for their +rejection of IDs, or that REAL ID Act wasn’t horribly mangled (in the +post-9/11 era I wouldn’t expect anything else). Just that without +well-functioning IDs we will never experience **full** potential what +Internet can bring to us. + +This experience is probably the reason why I was always skeptical to all +attempts to create Internet based identity systems (mainly OpenID), and +why I stay skeptical when I read `this post by Tim Bray`_. There are +problems which are not technological, but political/social, and such +problems cannot be resolved by improvements in technology, although most +programmers never believe it and will try to develop new and new +technology to solve it. I don’t believe Google will ever introduce any +system of Internet-wide identity which they would be willing to accept +even from other identity providers. Of course, Google (and Facebook, +Twitter, and others) will pretend that OAuth is such system, because it +allows innocent third party website to give up all their most valuable +data to them. But until I will be able to login to GMail with my +identity from Yahoo/Facebook, I won’t believe that Google will be a +honest member of the identity community. Many people on that webpage (me +included) asked Tim about BrowserID_. I am afraid that’s one things he +is not allowed to talk about. When Facebook/Google/Yahoo/AOL/Microsoft +killed by turning their blind eye OpenID, I don’t see any reasons why we +should expect any other attitude towards BrowserID. Which doesn’t mean +that BrowserID is doomed, but that we should expect it to be just +limited tool for independent openweb loving parties. + +.. _`since at least 1997`: + http://matej.ceplovi.cz/clanky/edi-mime.pdf +.. _EDI: + http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%20Electronic_Data_Interchange +.. _`electorate of some countries`: + http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Identity_document#United_States +.. _`system of IDs`: + http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REAL_ID_Act +.. _`this post by Tim Bray`: + http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/201x/2012/06/29/Becoming-an-Identity-guy +.. _BrowserID: + http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BrowserID |