Importance

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Abstract

The present invention relates to a system and a method for managing identities. A system is described for managing individual identities of persons or other entities interacting on a network of clients and servers, where the system comprises one or more identity servers or sites, with the identity servers or sites storing a number of identities, each identity representing identity information data of an individual person or entity, each identity having at least part of said information data being structured as a number of sets of data with at least part of said sets of data having one or more corresponding access rules selected from a plurality of different access rules. Here, the access rules of a given identity may be enforced by the identity server or site storing said given identity or by a server communicating with said identity server or site. The system of the present invention may further comprise one or more name servers constituting a namespace, where the name servers store name strings and addresses of identity servers and/or identity sites corresponding to each stored identity, said name servers thereby providing a mapping from the name strings to the corresponding identity servers or sites. The name servers tie together the identity servers or sites into a global network, creating a shared infrastructure for a variety of identity-related services and functions. The identity servers or sites are preferably self-contained, but cooperate in order to provide a coherent infrastructure, in particular by dividing between them the responsibility for authenticating identity owners.

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First Claim