Governance overview

The OSIA initiative is developed by the not-for-profit Secure Identity Alliance with the full support of its membership. It is governed under a formal structure including an independent OSIA Advisory Committee, with work carried out by the OSIA GitHub Community and an OSIA Workgroup. These bodies have transparent and publicly available terms of reference to guide intra and inter committee relations.

OSIA Advisory Committee

The OSIA Advisory Committee is an international advisory group consisting of members drawn from public and non-profit private organizations. They are bound to the SIA by an Advisory Observership. This group meets twice a year to review the progress of the OSIA Initiative, and offer strategic guidance for the initiative.

OSIA Workgroup

The OSIA Workgroup consists of experts in the fields of identity, security, privacy, and biometrics. These experts are Members, Associate Members and Advisory Observers of the SIA. The Workgroup manages the evolution of the OSIA functional and technical specifications. It also solicits feedback from the GitHub Open Community and has the power to control releases.

GitHub Community & license

OSIA is based on permissive free of charge (MIT) software license. The open source code has been published on the GitHub collaboration platform, where it is supervised by an external and independent consultant. Any country, technology partner or individual is free to download the functional and technical specifications to implement it in their customized foundational and sectoral ID systems or components.

Governments can also reference OSIA as Open Standardsin tenders.