Tim Cole about the European Identity Conference

You are, I, I don't know who said identity is dead, but I sure wish he was here at the conference because he would get a very, very vital impression of what's going on in this industry. We have over 400 attendees. We have over 50 exhibitors identity is definitely alive and kicking at the European identity conference 2011. I like to think that this conference is like embarking on a voyage together.

One that will hopefully lead to solving the identity problem and us making the world a better place for doing business, for interacting with friends, for having fun, without having to constantly look over our shoulders where the hackers and the identity feeds are lurking. My own VO in the last couple of months has been mainly to the us where I've been traveling all around and along the way I gathered the impression that the United States is actually catching up in with the rest of the world, in terms of privacy and data protection.

I was particularly pleased that the Obama administration has been producing in a line, a line of thinking pieces, such as the ends stick the national strategy for trusted identities in cyberspace, which is essentially a set of demands and standards calling for things like minimal disclosure, like keeping lying parties anonymous, and like prohibiting the use of linking and tracking all things that Europeans have had for years, and which seem to be gaining traction in the states.

I talked last view week at, I, I w in mountain view with Mike Garcia, he's a cybersecurity strategist with the us department of commerce, and he was one of the principal authors and stick. And he seems to be a very serious person. Personally, I would like to see the administration in Washington putting a little more bit more muscle behind this kind of suggestion calling on the industry to proceed voluntarily is nice, but this particular carrot could use a little bit more stick. Another important thing is consolidation. We have lost a few good friends here at EIC. Noel's not here, son.

That is normal in an industry that is progressing and maturing like the identity and access industry has over the last few years. On the other hand, we have some new phases here, Eric Zs from Google, Andy Ash of PayPal, Cheney of likewise Nelson, Jato of EIR, and I Henderson of Mik. This is a welcome and, and valuable addition to this conference. And we are hoping to get some very new insights through them. Others are using EIC as a platform and a meeting place. For instance, the open ID foundation on Monday held its on Tuesday held its pre-conference meeting here.

Drum and Reed has announced the world's First personal trust framework called connect. Me and the conference itself is evolving. Dave Kerns, who incidentally just joined co a Cole as an Analyst has hosted the world cafe kind of an un-conference around the idea of integrated IAM. And we are putting on tomorrow an all day crash course for it professionals on international privacy and it security law held by Dr. York laic. This will enable the participants who essentially are techies to better understand the basic compliance strategies when implementing cross-border and.