What is OpenID and how can we use it


Posted By: Thomas Shaw, 11:37pm Sunday 01 February 2009

OpenID http://www.openid.net is a decentralized, lightweight protocol for single sign-on and portable identity that is causing a massive transformation in today's internet. More than 25,000 Web sites currently accept OpenID, with double digit month over month growth. If you know of any recruitment sites that are accepting OpenID please let me know.


If I want to change my password for all of my social networking sites, I simply change my password once with my OpenID provider and it is reflected across all those sites! OpenID is well on the way to being the de facto standard for identifying yourself across the Internet. With that said, people are really starting to look hard at the next things we can do now that we know who everyone is.

For Users - Remember one username and password, not hundreds!

For Businesses - This means a lower cost of password and account management, while drawing new web traffic. OpenID lowers user frustration by letting users have control of their login.

For Programmers - OpenID is an open, decentralized, free framework for user-centric digital identity. OpenID takes advantage of already existing internet technology (URI, HTTP, SSL, Diffie-Hellman) and realizes that people are already creating identities for themselves whether it be at their blog, photo stream, profile page, etc. With OpenID you can easily transform one of these existing URIs into an account which can be used at sites which support OpenID logins.

Website Benefits
User Benefits
More information here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenID and http://dev.aol.com/openid-value-of-connnected-identity

Who Owns Or Profits From OpenID? Nobody and no one. OpenID was created to meet a need that was seen in the internet community, and as such it's creators want that community to have full access to it.

Who Supports OpenID? At present there are over 10,000 websites that respond to this feature.

You can quickly see which internet sites are presently OpenID enabled by checking out the directories. The list of websites that are Open ID enabled is growing by the day, so check the directories often.

https://www.myopenid.com/directory
http://openiddirectory.com/

OpenID is already being supported by a number of sites and providers such as Google, PayPal, Wordpress, Myspace, IBM, BBC, Microsoft AOL, Blogger, Flickr, Technorati, Yahoo,

Getting an Open ID is fast and easy. Simply create an account with one of the following providers and manage all your accounts in one single account.

ClaimID http://www.claimid.com
MyOpenID http://www.myopenid.com
myID.net http://www.myid.net
myVidoop http://www.myvidoop.com
VeriSign http://www.verisignlabs.com

Full list is available here http://wiki.openid.net/OpenID-Providers