Northwestern offers many ways to help your IT system authenticate or authorize users. This includes Active Directory, LDAP, Single Sign-On (SSO), Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA), Shibboleth, SAML, and others.
Directory services help provide people and systems with the ability to look up information about people based on various criteria from things as simple as their name to their Northwestern school affiliation, degree programs, etc. Directory Services include the Northwestern online directory, the ADS Active Directory forest, the LDAP directory, and various others.
NetID services take information from the HR or student system and create unified Northwestern credentials (NetIDs) that are then connected with information about each individual. NetIDs are then used as the primary way for people to interact with IT services. Other types of NetIDs can be created as well for specific people, organizations, or IT system purposes.
For IT system administrators, Northwestern provides privileged account management for systems that reside in the Northwestern data centers. These services help enable and audit administrative access to servers.
Wildcat Finder is a proprietary web application that provides multiple search options to identify individuals affiliated with the University in various capacities, including faculty, staff, students, contractors, and affiliates.