Jisc has announced the launch of a new service enabling researchers to access their digital resources and applications through a single, federated sign-on.
A world-first, Assent, provided by Jisc, enables simplified, seamless and secure access to the broad range of web and non-web services that researchers commonly need – from cloud, email and file storage services, through to desktop login, high performance computing (HPC) facilities and secure data communications.
Assent uses the same open standards and open source software that underpin the two leading federated access services in global education and research: eduroam, the world-wide single sign-on roaming service, and the UK Access Management Federation, which provides web-only single sign on. It works by combining these technologies to provide a powerful and flexible access management solution appropriate to the needs of research.
There are significant benefits in adopting Assent for both institutions and their researchers.
Institutions benefit by reducing the number of credentials issued to each user, greatly reducing the administrative burden and cost. User identities are managed by the users' home institutions, reducing the need to issue credentials to users from partner organisations.
For researchers, using Assent means they are able to seamlessly access the digital resources and applications they need to do their jobs, wherever it has been made available by a participating organisation.
A number of leading research-intensive institutions and HPC facilities were involved in the pilot of Assent – which went under the name of Moonshot – including the University of Glasgow and University of Cambridge, multi-disciplinary research organisation Science and Technologies Facilities Council (STFC), and UK synchrotron Diamond Light Source. Feedback has been extremely positive.
Jisc is also advising other national research and education networks to explore the use of this technology globally, and is collaborating with its European partners to develop the geographical footprint required by our research communities.
