So, what is Enole?
A platform for identity management utilizing near field communications, strong authentication, and lots more buzzwordy awesomeness to help developers build something just plain cool.
Enole builds an API that will help developers optimize our identity management in the real world, using, of course, technology. Enole’s ultimate goal would be a world where your phone is the only thing you’d need to be recognized as yourself. No ID, credit cards, passport, etc.
Ok. That wasn’t enough. GigaOM writer Liz Gannes gives more information. She met with the co-founder. And sometimes, examples are great:
Co-founder Kurt Collins came by our office yesterday and showed me a few examples: In one called Viploc, a Mac is set to lock itself when it’s not in Bluetooth range of its owner’s mobile phone. So when the phone is not present (or its Bluetooth is turned off), the computer logs out of its current session. In another demo, an iPad app called ZapCash, users can send each other money when they are in proximity of each other.
One of Enole’s early success is that they’ve managed to transform security into a key feature of their product. And that’s well done.
Rather than requiring a mobile app to be installed, Enole uses a unique identifier associated with a phone, such as a Bluetooth ID or MAC address. The company offers developers a REST-based API for identity and authentication using secure sockets layer encrypted transport and public key infrastructure (PKI). And to ensure reliability, Enole has also developed a way to use DNS to authenticate a user’s token should its servers be down.
I’ll keep an eye on this start-up.
