The goal of the Coconino Community College identity management initiative is to enable easy access to all technologies for students, faculty, and employees. The result of this initiative is a single login ID and password, which will be used for all services. This complex project affects every department within the Information Technology Division in addition to several other divisions within the College. This initiative is divided into two major phases with a completion date of May, 2011. An overview of the initiative with associated timelines is below.

Phase 1

During phase 1 all users (students, faculty, and staff) will have their login accounts moved to the Comet ID. The Comet ID is a new login ID that will use the first initials of the first and last names plus a series of three random generated alphanumeric characters. For example the login ID for John Doe will be jd12a. A change of login ID to the Comet ID format would not change your email address. That will remain in the format “first name . last name @ coconino.edu”, for example John.Doe@coconino.edu. The reasons for moving to a common ID format (Comet ID) are:

• Improved security – Hackers and other malicious entities need two major pieces of information, the login ID and the password. The current login ID format for employees is first initial and the last name, for example dhakanson for David Hakanson. By moving to the new Comet ID an entity would no longer be able to guess the login ID of an individual.
• Single account for all services – When moving to the Comet ID an individual will use their Comet ID as the login ID for all technology services including web site, portal, Blackboard Vista, Email, desktop computers, etc.
• Single account per role – With a common login ID format a staff or faculty member would not have a separate account when changing roles to be a student. Right now if an employee takes a class they use their @000 ID for Blackboard Vista and other services while using their employee id for other services. With the Comet ID an individual will use the same ID regardless of their role or the technology they are using

The timing of Phase 1 will be:

Summer term 2010 – Starting mid May, 2010 students will use their Comet ID for all technology services. Faculty who are teaching during summer term will use their Comet ID for Blackboard Vista as Vista will require all users to be on the Comet ID format. For employees not using Blackboard Vista – the IT division will move you to the Comet ID individually. The division will contact a person before and during the transition process. The process of transitioning employees to the Comet ID will continue through fall term.

Fall term 2010– Starting August 2010, the IT division will continue to transition employees to the Comet ID for all services. All faculty will use their Comet ID for Blackboard Vista.

End of fall term 2010 - All employees transitioned to the new Comet ID by the end of December, 2010.

Phase 2

In phase 2 the division will configure all technology services to use the same password. Therefore students, faculty, and staff will use a single login ID (their Comet ID) and password for every service. Once their password is changed the new password will be reflected in all technologies.

The timing of Phase 2 will be:

Spring term 2011 – Identity management committee to discuss password management strategy, which may include a determination of whether a change should be made to password complexity and / or extending length of time between password changes.

End of spring term 2011 – During mid May 2011, upon completion of spring term 2011, all technologies configured to authenticate to one system. Upon completion users will have a single password for every technology service. Once a password is changed by the user or IT Services, that change is reflected in all systems.

Communication Plan

IT Services is working with PR / Marketing and Student Support Services to market the new Comet ID to students. The following is an overview of methods will be utilized to inform users:

• Every technology service login page will have links to resources and a tool that enables a user to find their login ID. This enables self-service so that users are able to determine their login ID without calling the help desk.
• The computer labs will have signs that discuss the Comet ID.
• The web site will have information and tools to assist in the transition.
• Help desk staff will attend the first few minutes of every class held in a computer classroom to assist students with their login information.