Well, Memorandum M-26-18 is out.
“SUBJECT: Scaling Use of Login.gov to Deliver a Universal Sign-on for Public Services”
That pretty much says it all. More details on the problem:
“Agencies currently use a range of distinct digital identity solutions. This results in members of the public often needing to maintain multiple sign-ons to interact with agencies and services. It also results in agencies needlessly reverifying an individual’s identity, often at a significant cost, where an existing verification could satisfy operational requirements. Further, agencies often pay commercial vendors to verify identity attributes for which the Federal Government may itself maintain an official data source.”
The solution is “universal” adoption of Login.gov within one year for some sites, within two years for others.
But does universal mean that it is available, or that it is the sole supported method? I was just at a federal website this week that allowed me to authenticate with either Login.gov or ID.me. Other websites apparently use Clear. Will the alternate options disappear in the future?
Maybe not. The Memorandum allows use of other solutions, but agencies should continuously re-evaluate if they are still needed. Or as Biometric Update put it:
“That makes the final policy more than an instruction to add Login.gov alongside existing systems. It establishes an explicit presumption in favor of consolidating federal authentication and identity verification around the government-operated platform while preserving exceptions for services and users Login.gov cannot adequately accommodate.”
Technically not a rebuke of private enterprise, since Login.gov works with some private vendors as technology partners.
Let’s see how this plays out.
Bredemarket 