Press release: Jisc announces the development of a new access-management system for the UK
Over the past few years, Jisc has invested significant resources in the development of the next generation of access management technologies through its Core Middleware programmes. We are now planning a major initiative which will affect our funding of Athens, which will require institutions to make choices and decisions.
On Tuesday 28 February 2006, all Higher Education Vice Chancellors and Principals in Further Education in Northern Ireland, Wales and Scotland, along with publishers, will receive a letter from Jisc which details the changes.
Connecting students and staff to the valuable resources subscribed to by UK educational institutions is essential to the sector. Jisc has made this possible by funding the Athens service to provide usernames and passwords to users within UK education, putting us ahead of the rest of the world in providing a consistent and uniform access mechanism to a wide range of online content.
To maintain its leading-edge status, Jisc is devoting significant funds to and collaborating internationally on, the development and implementation of the next generation access-management system based on Shibboleth technology.
Benefits of the new system will include:
- Easier access to online resources for users
- Enhanced opportunities for collaboration
- Facilitation of national e-strategies
In September 2006, Jisc will launch its UK Access Management Federation for UK higher (HE) and further (FE) education institutions. Educational institutions throughout the UK will be invited to join the UK Federation and adopt new technology such as Shibboleth. This will provide institutions with a route to single sign-on to resources for users through the implementation of federated, devolved authentication.
The Athens service in its current form will not be funded by Jisc after July 2008. Jisc has established a transition programme with clear choices to minimise disruption to end-users. Jisc has been working closely with Eduserv throughout the process.
Jisc has produced roadmaps for institutions and publishers to clearly outline the choices that they have to make: these will be sent with the letters and can be viewed at the foot of this page.
Jisc will also be providing the community with support in the form of bulletins, events, training and early-adopter funding over the transition period.
If you would like to know more please do not hesitate to contact John Robinson or Nicole Harris. Information and experts will also be available at the UCISA and Jisc conferences in March and NetWorkShop in April.
Below are copies of the letters sent to Institutions and Publishers, the briefing paper introducing Shibboleth and Jisc guidelines for Education Institutions, Publishers and Service providers detailing the choices available and timescales for the transition programme.