FiXs Member Companies Issue HSPD-12 Aligned Credentials before Deadline
26 Oct 2006
Public-private Partnership Providing Secure, Low-cost Solution
Three founding members of the Federation for Identity and Cross-Credentialing Systems (FiXs) – EDS, Northrop Grumman and SRA International – are the first to provide identity management services on the FiXs network that comply with Homeland Security Presidential Directive-12 requirements.
FiXs is a public-private partnership dedicated to building and deploying a secure, interoperable identity and cross-credentialing network. HSPD-12 is a presidential mandate that establishes a government-wide standard for secure, reliable forms of identification issued by the federal government to employees and contractors. Government agencies were required to adopt a government-wide standard for secure and reliable identification by Oct. 27 via a standard federal smart card.
On Oct. 25, leaders from EDS, Northrop Grumman, SRA and other companies were issued cards in Chantilly, Va. It demonstrated the three companies’ capability to fulfill the government requirement through their HSPD-12 Identity Managed Services solution.
EDS, Northrop Grumman and SRA worked together with other FiXs member companies to build the FiXs network in 2005. It was modeled after the financial industry’s highly secure and widely accepted ATM (automated teller machine) approach, providing trusted and interoperable identity verification and credential authentication for contractors accessing secure government facilities and networks.
With the continued deployment of the FiXs network, EDS, Northrop Grumman and SRA issued identity management smart cards that meet HSPD-12 requirements to company employees and third parties in advance of the Oct. 27 directive deadline.
“FiXs is the first interoperable identity cross-credentialing network between the Department of Defense and its industry partners, providing a trusted identity authentication network, available to other government agencies and their contractors,” said Rick Sullivan, Vice President of Portfolio Management, EDS U.S. Government Solutions. “Through the managed service, public and private sectors will benefit from this lower-cost solution that affords convenience while improving transaction security and data privacy.”
For the FiXs network and HSPD-12 Identity Managed Services, EDS provides the EDS Assured IdentityTM Solution PDF, 447K and services as the enrollment function, Northrop Grumman provides the network operations management component and SRA provides the mobile authentication software/hardware component.
“On the FiXs network, government contractors, system integrators, and the like can be brought rapidly into compliance,” said Kent Schneider, Vice President, Business Development, Northrop Grumman Information Technology. “Through the HSPD-12 Identity Managed Services offering, now there is a way for organizations to essentially ‘outsource’ their HSPD-12 requirements, saving them considerable time and expense by maintaining the ability to use their own organization’s identity credentials for verification at facility and network entry points.”
By using HSPD-12 Identity Managed Services and the FiXs network, organizations will maintain HSPD-12 compliance even as the directive implementation progresses from physical access management to logical access control.
“This scalable, network-based solution adheres to requirements for security, privacy and interoperability, without a significant financial investment or redirection of valuable human resources,” said Tony Valletta, SRA Senior Vice President and Director, Defense Sector. “The economies of scale will provide substantial cost savings. In addition, government and industry employees now will have the convenience of using one credential at multiple facilities.”
EDS has more than 40 years of experience securing critical information for government and commercial clients, including more than 10 years’ experience with federal biometric and card-based access control systems. EDS is the only IT services integrator to have implemented a massive-scale smart card solution for the U.S. government, the Common Access Card program for the Defense Manpower Data Center. To date, EDS has delivered more than 11 million cards. Learn more about EDS’ identity management services.
For information about the FiXs network, FiXs member organizations and the HSPD-12 Identity Managed Services, visit www.FiXs.org.