9

Some OpenID Providers

While I don’t hear about it a lot recently these days, there are still some sites that I need OpenID to log in to. I had been using myOpenID from Janrain for this, but that service was retired. Unfortunately, So was my backup provider, ClaimID.

So, I went shopping for new providers! Here’s what I found:

Whatever OpenID provider you have, I highly suggest setting up delegation. OpenID delegation means you can use any website you control as your OpenID login. The delegate website is configured to use your chosen provider and you can switch anytime without having to update your login information on other sites.

How do you set up delegation? It’s easy! You just have to add the following two lines to the head of the site you want to act as delegate:

<link rel="openid.delegate" href="http://mywebsite.com/" />
<link rel="openid.server" href="https://myopenidprovider.com/" />

Replacing “mywebsite.com” with the site you want to act as delegate, and “myopenidprovider.com” with your chosen OpenID provider (e.g., openid.stackexchange.com). Make sure you have an account at the OpenID provider of your choice before doing this.

If you have a self-hosted WordPress blog, you can use this plugin instead of editing your theme files.

Thanks Aaron Parecki, Nicolas Ward, and Sumana Harihareswara ‏ for helping me compile this list. Know of an OpenID provider not already on the list above? Let me know in the comments!

No related posts.

9 comments

  1. Philip says:

    ClavID is another provider. They are known for accepting YubiKey for authentication.

    Depressingly, we have a shortage of OpenID acceptors (relying parties); everyone would rather be a provider as that’s more of a competitive advantage.

    • Christie Koehler says:

      I knew about Fedora OpenID, Kevin, but didn’t list it because I couldn’t find clear info on how a person would sign up for an account. Wanted to list services anyone could sign up for. Does one need to be a recognized Fedora volunteer to have an account?