Electronic Government: Planned e-Authentication Gateway Faces Formidable Development Challenges

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "For on-line government services that involve sensitive information, such as financial or personal information, it is important to be able to confirm the identity of potential users. This confirmation process, known as authentication, is crucial for security and user confidence. The General Services Administration (GSA) is developing an "e-Authentication gateway," which is to provide a consolidated electronic authentication service to support the e-government initiatives sponsored by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). The figure depicts schematically how the gateway process would work. GAO was asked to (1) assess GSA's progress in implementing the proposed initiative and (2) identify the challenges associated with implementing the gateway.