Your organization can become a Switch edu-ID Federation Partner, if your organization does not belong to the Switch Community but you want to contribute to the Switch edu-ID Federation. As Federation Partner Basic, you can integrate your web applications into Switch edu-ID and they may use the central edu-ID services required for a smooth operation within Switch edu-ID.
A Federation Partner Basic typically operates edu-ID-enabled web resources (Service Providers, SP) and makes them available for the users with an edu-ID-enabled account at one of the participating Home Organizations.
edu-ID-enabled web resource can be e-learning platforms, web shops, e-journal databases, etc. that make use of federated authentication and do authorize access to their applications based on the information they got via edu-ID from the Identity Provider (IdP) of the users home organization.
An organization joins as Federation Partner Plus if it wants to provide their student and staff users edu-ID-enabled accounts with a student or staff affiliation of their Home Organization. That way, these users can gain access to services registered in the Switch edu-ID Federation, provided a service authorizes the access, e.g. based on licensing conditions.
In addition, a Federation Partner Plus will also be entitled to contribute edu-ID-enabled web resources to the Switch edu-ID Federation as described aboce for Federation Partner Basic.
The following entities and organizations may qualify to become Federation Partner Basic:
The following entities and organizations may qualify to become Federation Partner Plus:
List all Switch edu-ID Federation Partners
In addition, a prospect Switch edu-ID Federation Partner Basic needs to be officially supported by a Switch edu-ID Participant from the Switch Community (a.k.a. "Sponsor") that will also sign the Application Form.
In case the prospect Federation Partner has well established, contracts-based, relationships with Switch edu-ID Participants, such an explicit sponsorship can be waived.
A prospect Switch edu-ID Federation Partner Plus needs to also sign a service agreement with Switch that regulates the operation of the Identity Provider component required.
The Switch edu-ID Service Description is the core document where all rights and obligations are listed, e.g. the Switch edu-ID Federation Policy in chapter 5. Chapter 5.2.2 refers to fees. At the moment, for becoming or being Federation Partner Basic, no fees get charged. However, Federation Partner Plus always includes a service fee.
For a Federation Partner Basic, interfederation is available as paid option to cover the additional support effort required, whereas this option is included for Federation Partner Plus. Details are available on request.
Switch will prepare the forms to be signed, provided you send us the following information to eduid-support@switch.ch:
Switch will then send you the customized documents ready to sign including the Switch edu-ID Service Description and the General Terms and Conditions for Services of Switch (GTC).
In case of any questions, please contact the Switch edu-ID team at eduid-support@switch.ch.
In order to technically join the federation, it is of course necessary to install, configure and register your service.
Checkout the Getting Started: Setting up a Service page for the options when deploying a SAML or OpenID Connect (OIDC) based service.
For deployiong a SAML Service Provider (SP), Switch strongly recommends to use the open-source Shibboleth implementation. For that purpose, we provide installation and configuration instructions.
More on the Federation Partner SAML Service Provider deployment page
Switch will get in contact with the Federation Partner to sort out the technical details. Federation Partners can first test the interoperability in the edu-ID Test Federation before they add their resource to the production Switch edu-ID Federation.