Microsoft To Expose Passport As XML-enabled .NET Web Service This Summer

As part of its growing portfolio of .NET services, Microsoft will expose its Passport authentication service as an XML Web service this summer, officials said.

The forthcoming Microsoft Passport Web Service, which will support XML and the delivery of Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) messages over HTTP, joins existing Microsoft Web services such as .NET Alerts and MapPoint Web Service.

The Passport Web Service will also support WS-Security, a specification designed to secure data stored by in the online authentication service. Microsoft, IBM and VeriSign submitted the latest version of the Web Services Security (WS-Security) specification to the Organization for the Advancement (OASIS) last June.

"We're exposing the Passport service as a Web service," said Steven VanRoekel, director of Web service marketing at Microsoft," in an interview with CRN here on Wednesday. "It'll add WS-Security so there's encryption and digital signatures, and it'll have a WSDL file."

Microsoft currently operates a Passport service on the Internet and has a Passport Software Development Kit (SDK) for developers. However, the availability of XML/SOAP and WS-Security capabilities of the forthcoming Passport Web Service due this summer will make it possible for developers to bind authentication within their own XML Web services.

Solution providers say support for WS-Security will help developers of business-to-consumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) applications get over their fears.

"It makes absolute sense. Why [should developers] deal with writing all of the security levels and the user identification list?" said Ted Dinsmore, president of Conchango, a New York based Microsoft Certified Partner working on .NET. "The caveat is whether organizations will trust that the list will not be used by someone else. It's a trust issue. We have had a number of customers look at this [issue] as part of .NET custom development projects."

Other solution providers also applauded the pending arrival of the Passport Web Service.

"We have had a tough time integrating Passport into custom applications and sites, so having it as a Web service may make it a lot easier," said Ken Winell, CEO and president of Econium, Totowa, NJ. "Plus we can manage the service with additional tools."

Microsoft said the Passport Web Service is just the tip of the iceberg as the company begins integrating more advanced Web service specifications such as WS-Security, WS-Reliable Messaging and WS-Transactions into its infrastructure products and services over the next 12 to 18 months.

At Professional Developers Conference in October, Microsoft is expected to debut a new software development kit for .NET MyServices and other business related Web services based on XML, SOAP, WSDL and UDDI, and WS-I standards, officials noted.

Microsoft also continues work on "Trustbridge," an effort detailed last year that will enable the Windows Server authentication system, Active Directory, and Passport, to connect disparate corporate systems together, said Neil Charney, director of .NET Platforms and Strategy at Microsoft.

"It will allow you to take an identification system and trust it across corporate boundaries so corporations can give their users access to outside data [without needing separate user names and passwords]," Charney said. "It's still being developed."

However, as Microsoft continues developing new .NET Web Services, officials predict the more advanced .NET Framework in Visual Studio.NET 2003 and Windows Server 2003, both released last week, will seed more substantial .NET development at enterprises in the next year.

Microsoft's latest toolset, for example, supports WS-Security, which will enable developers to harness the forthcoming Passport Web Service into their applications. The Windows Server integrates the latest .NET Framework as well as support for UDDI, which will enable companies to build catalogs of web services, Charney added.

In the forthcoming months, Microsoft will continue embedding Web service "plumbing" into its server applications such as BizTalk and future client applications including the "Longhorn" Windows XP upgrade to make it a better "consumer" of XML Web services, officials said.

Charney acknowledged that the game plan has shifted a bit since Microsoft launched the concept of .NET at Forum 2000 in 2000 and its "Hailstorm" plan in 2001.

However, he said .NET MYServices will have a role for consumers and that .NET Web Services such as Alerts and MapPoint are already in corporate use. Customers such as CitiGroup and Comverse, for example, have publicly announced their use of .NET Alerts.

Charney also said that the delivery of important .NET infrastructure products such as Visual Studio.NET and Windows Server 2003 last week and the completion of the Web service functionality for the WS-I specifications are significant milestones that will spur additional development in 2003.

Customers including Rent-A-Car, NASDAQ, Nationwide Insurance, L'Oreal and Naptheon are using .NET technologies, but Microsoft recognizes it's still early in the game.

"We're coming out of an era where customers demand we articulate the business value. Companies are looking at .NET, but they're critical, as they should be," Charney said. "They're still kicking the tires."

Pointing to Accenture as a top systems integrator of .NET, Charney also noted that customers will begin moving beyond using .NET as a way to integrate disparate back-end systems to pushing services out to the PC client.

While deploying .NET plumbing across its client and server product line, Microsoft remains intent on delivering more Microsoft .NET Web Services for businesses and consumers in 2003, Microsoft officials noted.

Another solution provider said the plan to release Passport Web service this summer will help spur Web service development across Microsoft's partner and developer communities.

"Passport today is not built completely on XML Web Services and Microsoft is in the process of rebuilding Passport around XML Web Services with the .NET Framework," said Keith Franklin, president of Empowered Software, is a Microsoft Certified Partner in Burr Ridge, Ill. "Once this is complete it will be much easier for developers to utilize Passport for the services they provides today and in the future. Much of this relies greatly on the specifications being put forth by WS-I."