The ISO/IEC 19770-2 Standard Published!

After three years of significant effort and peer review, the ISO/IEC 19770-2 standard has been published by ISO. Individuals and organizations can purchase the standard from ISO, ANSI, or your national bodies standards organization.

This standard is the first step in revolutionizing the software asset management market. As software gets more expensive, hardware costs continue to plummet and software audit fines and penalties are rising, software purchasers are realizing that they need to more effectively manage their software assets. The problem is that SAM programs are expensive to implement. One of the reasons for the high cost of SAM programs is due to resource costs involved in manually identifying software inventory, or fixing third party identification libraries that have been unverified and untested.  Software identification tags resolve this set of problems and associated costs!

Software publishers that publish software identification tags (SWID tags) will see a reduction in costs for overall software identification management. This will be seen in the training, negotiation efforts and, when it is required, the auditing process. Software publishers who utilize SWID tags can also promote the fact that they understand their customers' needs and frustrations and are working diligently to resolve the problems that are inherent in SAM programs - especially in the software discovery phase.

The 19770-2 standard resolves the issues with software identification. For publishers that recognize the value that proper software identification can bring to their organization as well as to their customers and to the rest of the SAM eco-system, TagVault.org will provide certification services that ensure all SWID tags conform to the standard, include normalized values for all elements, and are authoritatively signed with a digital signature and timestamp. These procedures allow end-user organizations, such as the US Government to validate that they are following the procedures recommended by the consensus audit guidelines (CAG).  SWID tags also allow all SAM eco-system members to know exactly what software is installed on the computing devices in their organization.

TagVault.org already has utilities available for its members that will create, validate and digitally sign SWID tags.  Members of TagVault.org receive access to the tool as well as documentation on certification requirements and certification services.  Members of TagVault.org who are providing and/or using SWID tags are seen as the leaders in the software asset management market.  Join TagVault.org today and help make the revolution happen!