EMS: a homegrown identity management system

Abstract

In 2005 Salem State College upgraded a nine year old email system to Novell's GroupWise. In addition, the College had recently implemented a One Card, web portal, and student administration systems.As we moved forward with these initiatives, we hoped to establish formal user management policies. An IT audit identified a number of problems which needed to be addressed. In the past each IT system was isolated, so users could have different usernames in each system and there were no policies for adding or removing users from these systems. We found: End users with different usernames in each system Users who were deceased or no longer employed Users added or removed from systems without authorization from Human Resources (HR) Users who were not authenticated before they were given College credentials (email address, ID card, etc.) We suspect these challenges/opportunities might exist at other institutions of higher education.With very little time and no budget, we developed EMS, the Employee Management System, a homegrown system designed to authenticate new users, issue usernames, communicate status changes with trusted systems, and continually audit the list of users.Cooperation within IT, and with HR, has helped to make EMS the central point of contact for all IT resources. This system is a work in progress and we are now looking at how this system might be used in other areas.This presentation will include a demonstration of EMS, discussions on where we are, where we are going, and lessons learned along the way.