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PODCAST

A Digital Identity Digest

Heather Flanagan

Welcome to A Digital Identity Digest, brought to you by Heather Flanagan of Spherical Cow Consulting. Here, we explore the evolving world of digital identity on the web. This podcast is spearheaded by Heather"s expertise, where she breaks down complex concepts, shares the latest trends, and provides insightful analyses in online identity management. Join Heather as she navigates this dynamic digital pasture, delivering content that"s both informative and engaging for tech enthusiasts, digital

technology tech news

All Episodes

00:18:20

Robots, Humans, and the Edges of the Open Web

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/12/02

This episode explores what the “open web” truly means amid shifting standards, AI automation, and evolving economic pressures. Drawing on discussions from IETF 124 and W3C TPAC, it highlights how browser architects, policy experts, and researchers are reexamining long-held assumptions about access, interoperability, and the role of automated agents.Learn why openness isn’t a binary state but a multidimensional spectrum shaped by values such as attribution, consent, and continuity. The conversation

en-US

00:18:34

Digital Identity Wallet Standards, the DC API, and...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/11/25

Digital identity wallets are becoming a central focus in global identity conversations, driven by regulatory pressure, rapid technical evolution, and growing expectations around interoperability. This episode examines how layered architectures, protocol choices, and platform behaviors shape the user experience in ways that are often misunderstood. Listeners will learn why the Digital Credentials API (DCAPI) is frequently blamed for issues it cannot control, how differing operating system and browser

en-US

00:14:51

The Regulator’s Dilemma

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/11/18

This episode explores the regulator’s dilemma at the heart of digital infrastructure, where accountability, compliance, and governance reshape the systems they aim to protect. Heather Flanagan examines how modern identity, critical infrastructure, and risk management challenges emerge as digital environments outgrow traditional oversight models.Listeners will learn why compliance-era controls no longer match today’s API-driven reality, how sovereignty contributes to Internet fragmentation, and why

en-US

00:14:09

The Paradox of Protection

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/11/11

When every digital system is labeled as critical infrastructure, do we actually make the Internet safer—or just more fragile? In this episode of The Digital Identity Digest, Heather Flanagan examines the growing tension between protection, control, and interdependence in our global digital ecosystem. Through examples from the U.S. and EU, Heather explores how expanding definitions of “critical” can blur accountability, create policy confusion, and undermine true cyber resilience. Listeners will

en-US

00:16:02

The Infrastructure We Forgot We Built

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/11/04

When AWS went down, payments failed and digital life froze — exposing how fragile our cloud-based world really is. In this episode of Digital Identity Digest, Heather Flanagan explores why AWS, Stripe, Twilio, and Okta have become the new critical infrastructure of global commerce. Discover how invisible digital dependencies shape resilience, why uptime isn’t true stability, and what “too big to fail” means in the age of APIs. Essential listening for anyone in digital identity, cloud computing,

en-US

00:16:24

Can Standards Survive Trade Wars and Sovereignty...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/10/28

For decades, standards development has been anchored in the idea that the Internet is (and should be) one global network. If we could just get everyone in the room—vendors, governments, engineers, and civil society—we could hash out common rules that worked for all.

en-US

00:12:01

The People Problem: How Demographics Decide the...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/10/21

I've been having an intellectually fascinating time diving into Internet fragmentation and how it is shaped by supply chains more than protocols. There’s another bottleneck ahead, though, one that’s even harder to reroute: people. Innovation doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It requires human talent that builds systems and sets standards.

en-US

00:15:19

Why Tech Supply Chains, Not Protocols, Set the Limits...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/10/14

I had one of those chance airplane conversations recently—the kind that sticks in your mind longer than the flight itself. My seatmate was reading a book about artificial intelligence, and at one point they described the idea of an “infinitely growing AI.” I couldn’t help but giggle a bit.

en-US

00:16:34

The End of the Global Internet

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/10/07

Many people reading this post grew up believing and expecting in a single, borderless Internet: a vast network of networks that let us talk, share, and build without arbitrary walls. I like that model, probably because I am a globalist, but I don't think that's where the world is heading.

en-US

00:11:54

Delegation and Consent: Who Actually Benefits?

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/09/30

When not distracted by AI (which, you have to admit, is very distracting) I’ve been thinking a lot about delegation in digital identity. We have the tools that allow administrators or individuals grant specific permissions to applications and service. In theory, it’s a clean model.

en-US

00:07:50

Pirates, Librarians, and Standards Development

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/09/23

With the right motivation, even I will write a blog post on a dare. And the dare I got was to write a post about what librarians and pirate captains have in common, and why it matters for standards development. (If you can’t have fun when writing, what’s the point?)

en-US

00:11:21

Who Really Pays When AI Agents Run Wild? Incentives,...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/09/16

Google recently gave us something we’ve been waiting on for years: hard numbers on how much energy an AI prompt uses. According to their report, the median Gemini prompt consumes just 0.24 watt-hours of electricity — roughly running a microwave for a second — along with some drops of water for cooling.

en-US

00:10:38

AI Permissions vs. Human Permissions: What Really...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/09/09

We’ve been talking about identity and access for people for decades (millennia if you think outside tech). Policies, role assignments, reviews, zero trust — these are familiar tools. The assumptions that go into them, however, don't quite work when the "user" is no longer a person." Enter in the AI Agent.

en-US

00:12:22

Roads, Robots, and Responsibility: Why Agentic AI...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/09/02

We don’t spend much time thinking about the roads we drive on—until one cracks, collapses, or dumps us somewhere we didn’t mean to be. Identity in the age of agentic AI? Same deal. It’s infrastructure. Like a good road, it needs to be ready for traffic we can’t imagine.

en-US

00:09:35

Bot or Not? Why Incentives Matter More Than Identity

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/08/26

Let’s start with a confession: I love bots. Or at least, I love the idea of them. They’re efficient, tireless, and, if designed well, can be downright helpful. (They can also be downright unhelpful, but that's a topic for a different blog post.) But the incentives around bot traffic are completely out of balance, and that makes things messy.

en-US

00:13:35

Working Group Chair Skills: Standards Work Isn’t Just...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/08/19

This one’s for everyone who’s ever said, "I’m not technical enough to participate in standards development."If you’ve wondered what working group chair skills actually matter, I have news for you: you don’t need to be a spec-writing wizard to be effective. I do get it, though.

en-US

00:12:37

Agentic AI in the Open Standards Community: Standards...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/08/12

If you want to follow what's happening in AI, it helps to know where the conversations are happening. That doesn't just mean the headlines and white papers; it means the standards bodies, working groups, and protocol discussions shaping the infrastructure AI systems will have to live with (and live inside).

en-US

00:10:36

Not Just a Technical Problem: Why Fighting...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/08/05

Disinformation. Misinformation. Malinformation. These terms get used interchangeably, but they’re not the same thing. That distinction matters when designing resilient infrastructure that supports trust. Most of our efforts to address these problems focus on content, activities like fact-checking, moderation, and takedown requests.

en-US

00:11:24

What WSIS+20 Taught Me About Digital Identity and...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/07/29

I went to Geneva to understand what, if anything, people were saying regarding digital identity and standards in a governance-focused forum. My brain is now full. I adore the topic of identity and the standards development process; everything from the brilliant minds, the challenges, and the intense edge cases.

en-US

00:08:46

Kill the Wallet? Rethinking the Metaphors Behind...

A Digital Identity Digest ·

2025/07/22

Much like "the cloud" or "the superhighway", the metaphor of a "wallet" has become convenient shorthand for a tangle of technical, policy, and usability decisions. As we keep building out digital identity ecosystems with verifiable credentials, identity wallets, and cross-jurisdictional trust models, I ask: is the metaphor still helping us?

en-US

32 results

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