Identity provider
An identity provider (abbreviated IdP or IDP) is a system entity that creates, maintains, and manages identity information for principals and also provides authentication services to relying applications within a federation or distributed network.
Types of identity providers
OpenID provider
OpenID Connect (OIDC) is an identity layer on top of OAuth. In the domain model associated with OIDC, an identity provider is a special type of OAuth 2.0 authorization server. Specifically, a system entity called an OpenID Provider issues JSON-formatted identity tokens to OIDC relying parties via a RESTful HTTP API.
SAML identity provider
The Security Assertion Markup Language (SAML) is a set of profiles for exchanging authentication and authorization data across security domains. In the SAML domain model, an identity provider is a special type of authentication authority. Specifically, a SAML identity provider is a system entity that issues authentication assertions in conjunction with an SSO profile of SAML. A relying party that consumes these authentication assertions is called a SAML service provider.
See also
- Federated identity
- Identity management system
- SAML identity provider