Lexicon

The Lexicon was developed by the Identity Gang it is a resource for the whole community to have a shared language.The following terms and definitions have been compiled since August 2005. See also Lexicon Goal and Lexicon Style Guide.


 * 1) Agent
 * 2) Claim
 * 3) Claimant
 * 4) Digital Identity
 * 5) Digital Identity Provider
 * 6) Digital Subject
 * 7) Entity
 * 8) Identity Attribute
 * 9) Identity Context
 * 10) Party
 * 11) Persona
 * 12) Relying Party

Rework: We continuously fix bugs in the Lexicon, but I think Persona in particular needs some rework (i.e. shift its definition from being based on DI to being based on DS).

Proposals, Pending
The following links propose changes, additions, deletions, etc. to the lexicon. They are being worked on by small groups and when fully baked will be presented to the list:

As part of a "Lexicon 2.0" push, we're currently thinking of trying to define:
 * Federation (a couple of interpretations of such)
 * Confirmation (proposed by Eric Norman)
 * User Centric
 * Identity Issuer (to preplace Identity Provider)
 * Service Provider (as a synonym of Relying Party Agent)
 * Identity Context -needs to be broadened and woven into the definition of Digital Subject.
 * i-card (suggested by PaulT and discussed under a tree at MIT during the June IdMashup conference. See these notes)

It is also worth Noting that the ITU Lexicon/Ecosystem group has put forward that it would like to define the following terms. These could change of course but as of April 25 this was the list.


 * Identity Management
 * Discovery
 * Reputation
 * Proofing
 * Trust
 * Asymetric Authentication
 * Privacy
 * Security
 * Anonymity

Jaco Lexicon Change2 - adding
 * virtual identity,
 * virtual personality
 * virtual personality legal entity

Proposals, Incorporated
The following links have been incorporated into the lexicon:


 * Paul Lexicon Changes -adding: party, agent, relying party, identity povider, identity context, adding some comments to digital identity and claim, deleting user. Incorporated 2-Jan-2006

Related Work

 * 1) Anonymity, Unlinkability, Unobservability, Pseudonymity, and Identity Management - A Consolidated Proposal for Terminology
 * 2) Modinis-IDM Common Terminological Framework for Interoperable Electronic Identity Management
 * 3) SAML 2.0 glossary
 * 4) OpenPrivacy.org definitions page
 * 5) PT Ong's glossary
 * 6) Stefan Brand's Primer--though more than a glossary this paper (also listed in [Reference Documents]) is helpful
 * 7) Digital Identity - Wikipedia entry
 * 8) Identity Concepts and Definitions, Dan Blum, Burton Group, --courtesy of Jamie Lewis (also listed [Reference Documents])
 * 9) ISO/ITU X.911 - definitions in section 6.5
 * 10) See also Reference