InCommon Round-Up: 5 Stories You May Have Missed

Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

InCommon Federation Community Consultation Open Through Feb. 28

An InCommon Federation community consultation of the 2024 InCommon Federation Proxies Working Group Report is now open to the community. The consultation window closes on Feb. 28 at 8 p.m. ET. 

The Federation Proxies Working Group has been working to further its understanding of proxies currently deployed in the InCommon Trust Federation.

The report is a collection of the group’s findings regarding federation proxies’ roles in the federation ecosystem, and it recommends the next steps for the InCommon Federation and the wider community to better support proxies and improve federation trust.

We look forward to the community’s feedback on the report and encourage you to register for consultation before the end of February.

What’s New at InCommon Academy?

InCommon Academy — which provides learning opportunities for IAM practitioners in research and higher education — is refreshing its training catalog in 2025.

Through redesigned courses and reimagined programs, InCommon Academy is delivering more flexibility, expanded learning opportunities, and interactive experiences across its learning and engagement portfolio. 

Take a look at what is coming down the pipeline in early 2025.

Critical Trends in IAM and Guidance for Higher Ed for 2025

The Feb. 19 IAM Online session featured six speakers from across the trust and identity industry to define key areas that higher education leadership needs to stay ahead of this year.

The six panelists covered AI-powered IAM, OpenID Federation, federation proxies, and important perspectives from community leaders. 

If you weren’t able to attend this important IAM Online session, you can catch up on our YouTube channel.

Grouper Documentation Team Helps Address Community Needs

Formed in 2023, the Grouper documentation team is a volunteer-led effort that helps improve the features and deployment of the enterprise group and access management system.

When the community group was in its infancy, Noelette Stout of Idaho State University stepped up to coordinate the effort.

Ken Klingenstein Reflects on 20 Years of InCommon

After 20 years of helping to build InCommon from the ground up, Internet2’s evangelist for Trust and Identity, Ken Klingenstein, took a moment to reflect on InCommon’s progress and impact.

“Trust, particularly multilateral trust, isn’t about a single institution. Rather, it is a community asset. Creating trust has been a heavy lift over decades as we have worked to align campus identity and access management infrastructures and processes to reliably trust each other across thousands of organizations. Technologies, procedures, contracts, and cultures are all touched,” Ken wrote in his blog.

Ken also looks past the horizon for InCommon, tying together InCommon’s roots to the strategy laid out in the Futures2 report.