SP 800-63C, Digital Identity Guidelines: Federation and Assertions

<!DOCTYPE html> <html lang="en-us" xml:lang="en-us"> <head><script type="text/javascript" src="/_static/js/bundle-playback.js?v=HxkREWBo" charset="utf-8"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/_static/js/wombat.js?v=txqj7nKC" charset="utf-8"></script> <script>window.RufflePlayer=window.RufflePlayer||{};window.RufflePlayer.config={"autoplay":"on","unmuteOverlay":"hidden"};</script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/_static/js/ruffle/ruffle.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript"> __wm.init("https://web.archive.org/web"); __wm.wombat("https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/63/c/upd2/final","20240112063546","https://web.archive.org/","web","/_static/", "1705041346"); </script> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/_static/css/banner-styles.css?v=S1zqJCYt" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/_static/css/iconochive.css?v=3PDvdIFv" />  <meta charset="utf-8"/> <title>SP 800-63C, Digital Identity Guidelines: Federation and Assertions | CSRC</title> <meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8"/> <meta http-equiv="content-style-type" content="text/css"/> <meta http-equiv="content-script-type" content="text/javascript"/> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0"/> <meta name="msapplication-config" content="/CSRC/Media/images/favicons/browserconfig.xml"/> <meta name="theme-color" content="#000000"/> <meta name="google-site-verification" content="xbrnrVYDgLD-Bd64xHLCt4XsPXzUhQ-4lGMj4TdUUTA"/> <meta description="This document and its companion documents, SP 800-63, SP 800-63A, and SP 800-63B, provide technical and procedural guidelines to agencies for the implementation of federated identity systems and for assertions used by federations. This publication supersedes corresponding sections of SP 800-63-2. These guidelines provide technical requirements for federal agencies implementing digital identity services and are not intended to constrain the development or use of standards outside of this purpose. This guideline focuses on the use of federated identity and the use of assertions to implement identity federations. Federation allows a given credential service provider to provide authentication and (optionally) subscriber attributes to a number of separately-administered relying parties. Similarly, relying parties may use more than one credential service provider."/>  <meta name="dcterms.title" content="NIST Special Publication (SP) 800-63C, Digital Identity Guidelines: Federation and Assertions"/> <meta name="dcterms.description" content="This document and its companion documents, SP 800-63, SP 800-63A, and SP 800-63B, provide technical and procedural guidelines to agencies for the implementation of federated identity systems and for assertions used by federations. This publication supersedes corresponding sections of SP 800-63-2. These guidelines provide technical requirements for federal agencies implementing digital identity services and are not intended to constrain the development or use of standards outside of this purpose. This guideline focuses on the use of federated identity and the use of assertions to implement identity federations. Federation allows a given credential service provider to provide authentication and (optionally) subscriber attributes to a number of separately-administered relying parties. Similarly, relying parties may use more than one credential service provider."/>  <meta name="dcterms.creator" content="Author: Paul Grassi (NIST)"/> <meta name="dcterms.creator" content="Author: Ellen Nadeau (NIST)"/> <meta name="dcterms.creator" content="Author: Justin Richer (Bespoke Engineering)"/> <meta name="dcterms.creator" content="Author: Sarah Squire (Bespoke Engineering)"/> <meta name="dcterms.creator" content="Author: James Fenton (Altmode Networks)"/> <meta name="dcterms.creator" content="Author: Naomi Lefkovitz (NIST)"/> <meta name="dcterms.creator" content="Author: Jamie Danker (DHS)"/> <meta name="dcterms.creator" content="Author: Yee-Yin Choong (NIST)"/> <meta name="dcterms.creator" content="Author: Kristen Greene (NIST)"/> <meta name="dcterms.creator" content="Author: Mary Theofanos (NIST)"/>  <meta name="dcterms.date.created" schema="ISO8601" content="2020-03-02"/> <meta name="dcterms.identifier" content="https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/63/c/upd2/final"/> <meta name="dcterms.language" scheme="DCTERMS.RFC1766" content="EN-US"/>  <meta name="citation_title" content="Digital Identity Guidelines: Federation and Assertions"/> <meta name="citation_publication_date" content="2020/03/02"/> <meta name="citation_doi" content="https://doi.org/10.6028/NIST.SP.800-63c"/> <meta name="citation_technical_report_number" content="NIST Special Publication (SP) 800-63C"/> <meta name="citation_technical_report_institution" content="National Institute of Standards and Technology"/> <meta name="citation_keywords" content="assertions,authentication,credential service provider,digital authentication,electronic authentication,electronic credentials,federations"/> <meta name="citation_language" content="en"/> <meta name="citation_pdf_url" content="https://doi.org/10.6028/NIST.SP.800-63c"/> <meta name="citation_abstract_html_url" content="https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/63/c/upd2/final"/>  <meta name="citation_author" content="Grassi, Paul"/> <meta name="citation_author" content="Nadeau, Ellen"/> <meta name="citation_author" content="Richer, Justin"/> <meta name="citation_author" content="Squire, Sarah"/> <meta name="citation_author" content="Fenton, James"/> <meta name="citation_author" content="Lefkovitz, Naomi"/> <meta name="citation_author" content="Danker, Jamie"/> <meta name="citation_author" content="Choong, Yee-Yin"/> <meta name="citation_author" content="Greene, Kristen"/> <meta name="citation_author" content="Theofanos, Mary"/>  <meta name="og:site_name" content="CSRC | NIST"/> <meta name="og:type" content="article"/> <meta name="og:url" content="https://web.archive.org/web/20240112063546im_/https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/63/c/upd2/final"/> <meta name="og:title" content="NIST Special Publication (SP) 800-63C, Digital Identity Guidelines: Federation and Assertions"/> <meta name="og:description" content="This document and its companion documents, SP 800-63, SP 800-63A, and SP 800-63B, provide technical and procedural guidelines to agencies for the implementation of federated identity systems and for assertions used by federations. This publication supersedes corresponding sections of SP 800-63-2. These guidelines provide technical requirements for federal agencies implementing digital identity services and are not intended to constrain the development or use of standards outside of this purpose. This guideline focuses on the use of federated identity and the use of assertions to implement identity federations. Federation allows a given credential service provider to provide authentication and (optionally) subscriber attributes to a number of separately-administered relying parties. Similarly, relying parties may use more than one credential service provider."/> <meta name="article:author" content="Grassi, Paul"/> <meta name="article:author" content="Nadeau, Ellen"/> <meta name="article:author" content="Richer, Justin"/> <meta name="article:author" content="Squire, Sarah"/> <meta name="article:author" content="Fenton, James"/> <meta name="article:author" content="Lefkovitz, Naomi"/> <meta name="article:author" content="Danker, Jamie"/> <meta name="article:author" content="Choong, Yee-Yin"/> <meta name="article:author" content="Greene, Kristen"/> <meta name="article:author" content="Theofanos, Mary"/> <meta name="article:tag" content="assertions,authentication,credential service provider,digital authentication,electronic authentication,electronic credentials,federations"/> <meta name="article:published_time" content="2020-03-02"/> <link rel="apple-touch-icon" sizes="180x180" href="/web/20240112063546im_/https://csrc.nist.gov/images/icons/apple-touch-icon.png"/> <link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="/web/20240112063546im_/https://csrc.nist.gov/images/icons/favicon-32x32.png" sizes="32x32"/> <link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="/web/20240112063546im_/https://csrc.nist.gov/images/icons/favicon-16x16.png" sizes="16x16"/> <link rel="manifest" href="/web/20240112063546/https://csrc.nist.gov/images/icons/manifest.json"/> <link rel="mask-icon" href="/web/20240112063546im_/https://csrc.nist.gov/images/icons/safari-pinned-tab.svg" color="#000000"/> <link href="/web/20240112063546im_/https://csrc.nist.gov/CSRC/Media/images/favicons/favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon" rel="shortcut icon"/> <link href="/web/20240112063546im_/https://csrc.nist.gov/CSRC/Media/images/favicons/favicon.ico" type="image/x-icon" rel="icon"/> <link href="/web/20240112063546cs_/https://csrc.nist.gov/dist/app.css" rel="stylesheet"/>  <style> .grecaptcha-badge { visibility: hidden; } </style> <script async type="text/javascript" id="_fed_an_ua_tag" src="https://web.archive.org/web/20240112063546js_/https://dap.digitalgov.gov/Universal-Federated-Analytics-Min.js?agency=nist&subagency=csrc&pua=UA-66610693-15&yt=true&exts=xsd,xml,wav,mpg,mpeg,avi,rtf,webm,ogg,ogv,oga,map,otf,eot,svg,ttf,woff"></script> <style id="antiClickjackCss"> body > * { display: none !important; } #antiClickjack { display: block !important; } </style> <noscript> <style id="antiClickjackNoScript"> body > * { display: block !important; } #antiClickjack { display: none !important; } </style> </noscript> <script type="text/javascript" id="antiClickjackScript"> if (self === top) { // no clickjacking var antiClickjack = document.getElementById("antiClickjackCss"); antiClickjack.parentNode.removeChild(antiClickjack); } else { setTimeout(tryForward(), 5000); } function tryForward() { top.location = self.location; } </script>  <script async src="https://web.archive.org/web/20240112063546js_/https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtag/js?id=G-TSQ0PLGJZP"></script> <script> 聽聽window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; 聽聽function gtag(){dataLayer.push(arguments);} 聽聽gtag('js', new Date()); 聽聽gtag('config', 'G-TSQ0PLGJZP'); </script>  <script>(function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://web.archive.org/web/20240112063546/https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-MZQC4NCJ');</script>  </head> <body>  <noscript><iframe src="https://web.archive.org/web/20240112063546if_/https://www.googletagmanager.com/ns.html?id=GTM-MZQC4NCJ" height="0" width="0" style="display:none;visibility:hidden"></iframe></noscript>  <div id="antiClickjack" style="display: none;"> <strong style="font-size: 1.6rem;">You are viewing this page in an unauthorized frame window.</strong> <p>This is a potential security issue, you are being redirected to <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20240112063546/https://csrc.nist.gov/">https://csrc.nist.gov</a>.</p> </div> <section class="usa-banner" aria-label="Official government website"> <div class="usa-accordion container"> <header class="usa-banner__header"> <noscript> <p style="font-size: 0.85rem; font-weight: bold;">You have JavaScript disabled. 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this site https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/63/c/upd2/final" class="social-email"><i class="fa fa-envelope fa-fw" aria-hidden="true"></i><span class="sr-only">Share ia Email</span></a> </div> <p class="hidden-lg hidden-md">     <a href="#pubs-documentation" class="btn btn-lg btn-info" id="pub-topics-anchor-sm">Documentation</a>     <a href="#pubs-topics" class="btn btn-lg btn-info" id="pub-topics-anchor-sm">Topics</a> </p> <div class="row"> <div class="col-md-8 col-sm-12 publication-panel"> <p> <strong>Date Published:</strong> <span id="pub-release-date" data-date-type="citation">June 2017 (includes updates as of 03-02-2020)</span><br/> </p> <p> <strong>Supersedes:</strong> <span id="pub-supersedes-container" data-total="1"> <a href="/web/20240112063546/https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/63/c/upd1/final" id="pub-supersedes-0">SP 800-63C (12/01/2017)</a> </span><br/> </p> <h4>Author(s)</h4> <p id="pub-authors-container" data-total="10"> <span id="pub-author-0">Paul Grassi (NIST)</span>, <span id="pub-author-1">Ellen Nadeau (NIST)</span>, <span id="pub-author-2">Justin Richer (Bespoke Engineering)</span>, <span id="pub-author-3">Sarah Squire (Bespoke Engineering)</span>, <span id="pub-author-4">James Fenton (Altmode Networks)</span>, <span id="pub-author-5">Naomi Lefkovitz (NIST)</span>, <span id="pub-author-6">Jamie Danker (DHS)</span>, <span id="pub-author-7">Yee-Yin Choong (NIST)</span>, <span id="pub-author-8">Kristen Greene (NIST)</span>, <span id="pub-author-9">Mary Theofanos (NIST)</span> </p> <div class="bs-callout bs-callout-success pub-abstract-callout"> <h4 id="pubs-abstract-header">Abstract</h4> <div class="hidden-sm hidden-xs hidden-xxs" id="pub-detail-abstract-info"><p>This document and its companion documents, SP 800-63, SP 800-63A, and SP 800-63B, provide technical and procedural guidelines to agencies for the implementation of federated identity systems and for assertions used by federations. This publication supersedes corresponding sections of SP 800-63-2.</p> <p>These guidelines provide technical requirements for federal agencies implementing digital identity services and are not intended to constrain the development or use of standards outside of this purpose. This guideline focuses on the use of federated identity and the use of assertions to implement identity federations. Federation allows a given credential service provider to provide authentication and (optionally) subscriber attributes to a number of separately-administered relying parties. Similarly, relying parties may use more than one credential service provider.</p></div> <div class="hidden-lg hidden-md"> <div id="pub-detail-abstract-min"> This document and its companion documents, SP 800-63, SP 800-63A, and SP 800-63B, provide technical and procedural guidelines to agencies for the implementation of federated identity systems and for assertions used by federations. This publication supersedes corresponding sections of SP 800-63-2.... <a href="#pubs-abstract-header" id="pub-detail-abs-show">See full abstract</a> </div> <div id="pub-detail-abstract-all" style="display: none;"> <p>This document and its companion documents, SP 800-63, SP 800-63A, and SP 800-63B, provide technical and procedural guidelines to agencies for the implementation of federated identity systems and for assertions used by federations. This publication supersedes corresponding sections of SP 800-63-2.</p> <p>These guidelines provide technical requirements for federal agencies implementing digital identity services and are not intended to constrain the development or use of standards outside of this purpose. This guideline focuses on the use of federated identity and the use of assertions to implement identity federations. Federation allows a given credential service provider to provide authentication and (optionally) subscriber attributes to a number of separately-administered relying parties. Similarly, relying parties may use more than one credential service provider.</p><br/> <a href="#pubs-abstract-header" id="pub-detail-abs-hide">Hide full abstract</a> </div> </div> <h4>Keywords</h4> <span id="pub-keywords-container" data-total="7"> <span id="pub-keyword-0">assertions</span>; <span id="pub-keyword-1">authentication</span>; <span id="pub-keyword-2">credential service provider</span>; <span id="pub-keyword-3">digital authentication</span>; <span id="pub-keyword-4">electronic authentication</span>; <span id="pub-keyword-5">electronic credentials</span>; <span id="pub-keyword-6">federations</span> </span> </div> <h5>Control Families</h5> <p> <span id="pub-control-fam-container" data-total="0">None selected</span> </p> </div> <div class="col-md-4 col-sm-12"> <div class="bs-callout bs-callout-success" id="pubs-documentation"> <h4>Documentation</h4> <p> <strong>Publication:</strong><br/> <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20240112063546/https://doi.org/10.6028/NIST.SP.800-63c" id="pub-doi-link"> <i class="fa fa-external-link" aria-hidden="true"></i> https://doi.org/10.6028/NIST.SP.800-63c </a><br/> <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20240112063546/https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/SpecialPublications/NIST.SP.800-63c.pdf" id="pub-local-download-link"> <i class="fa fa-download"></i> Download URL </a><br/> </p> <p> <strong>Supplemental Material:</strong><br/> <span id="pub-supp-container" data-total="0">None available</span><br/> </p> <p> <strong>Publication Parts:</strong><br/> <span id="pub-part-container" data-total="3"> <a href="/web/20240112063546/https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/63/3/upd2/final" id="pub-part-link-0">SP 800-63-3</a><br/> <a href="/web/20240112063546/https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/63/a/upd2/final" id="pub-part-link-1">SP 800-63A</a><br/> <a href="/web/20240112063546/https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/63/b/upd2/final" id="pub-part-link-2">SP 800-63B</a><br/> </span> </p> <p> <strong>Related NIST Publications:</strong><br/> <span id="pub-related-container" data-total="1"> <a href="/web/20240112063546/https://csrc.nist.gov/pubs/sp/800/63/4/iprd" id="pub-related-link-0">SP 800-63-4 <span>(Draft)</span></a><br/> </span> </p> <p> <strong>Document History:</strong><br/> <span id="pub-history-container" data-total="1"> 03/02/20: <span id="pub-history-link-0" data-current-document="true">SP 800-63C (Final)</span><br/> </span> </p> </div> <div class="bs-callout bs-callout-danger" id="topicsCallout-lg"> <h4>Topics</h4> <strong id="pub-cat-0">Security and Privacy</strong> <p> <a id="pub-cat-top-0-0" href="/web/20240112063546/https://csrc.nist.gov/topics/security-and-privacy/identity-and-access-management/authentication">authentication</a> </p> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div id="footer-pusher"></div> </div> <footer id="footer"> <div class="container"> <div class="row"> <div class="col-sm-6"> <span class="hidden-xs"> <a 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SP 800-63C, Digital Identity Guidelines: Federation and Assertions | CSRC