U-Prove is afree and open-source[1] technology and accompanyingsoftware development kit[2] for user-centricidentity management. The underlyingcryptographic protocols were designed by Dr.Stefan Brands[3] and further developed by Credentica and, subsequently,Microsoft.[4] The technology was developed to allow internet users to disclose only the minimum amount ofpersonal data when makingelectronic transactions as a way to reduce the likelihood ofprivacy violations.[5]
U-Prove enables application developers to reconcile seemingly conflictingsecurity andprivacy objectives (includinganonymity), and allows for digital identity claims to be efficiently tied to the use of tamper-resistant devices such assmart cards. Application areas of particular interest include cross-domain enterprise identity and access management, e-government SSO and data sharing, electronic health records, anonymous electronic voting, policy-based digital rights management, social networking data portability, and electronic payments.
In 2008, Microsoft committed to opening up the U-Prove technology.[1] As the first step, in March 2010 the company released a cryptographic specification andopen-source API implementation code for part of the U-Prove technology as aCommunity Technology Preview under Microsoft'sOpen Specification Promise.[6] Since then, several extensions have been released under the same terms and the technology has been tested in real-life applications.
In 2010, theInternational Association of Privacy Professionals (IAPP) honored U-Prove with the2010 Privacy Innovation Award for Technology.[7][8]
Microsoft also won the inEuropean Identity Award in theBest Innovation category for U-Prove at the European Identity Conference 2010.[9]
The U-Prove Crypto SDK forC# is licensed underApache License 2.0 and the source code is available onGitHub.[10]
Microsoft also provides aJavaScript SDK that implements the client-side of the U-Prove Cryptographic Specification.[11]
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