PISCATAWAY, N.J., Dec. 7 /PRNewswire/ -- The Kantara Initiative announced today that Neustar, Inc. (NYSE: NSR) has joined its Board of Trustees, and will play an integral role in shaping the organization's strategic direction on a global basis. Peter Davis, director and distinguished member of the technical staff within Neustar's Advanced Technology Group, will serve as Neustar's representative to the Kantara Initiative's Board.

The Kantara Initiative fosters the interoperability and large-scale deployability of identity management standards and frameworks with actions that help ensure secure, privacy-respecting identity-based online interactions so that networks will become more natively trustworthy environments. An independently governed nonprofit organization, the Kantara Initiative is a global identity management, open Web and application developer community made up of enterprises, mobile operators, Web 2.0 service providers, e-Government agencies, IT vendors, and consumer electronics vendors, along with developers and members of the open source, legal and privacy communities.

"We are thrilled that Neustar has joined our Board of Trustees and will be contributing its unique perspective and valuable expertise on identity interoperability and portability to our current and future efforts," said Brett McDowell, executive director at Kantara Initiative. "Kantara Initiative founders, members and participants are successful industry stakeholders in their own rights. To their credit, they recognize that the state of identity management is at a crossroads, and that collaboration - something Kantara Initiative was designed specifically to foster - is absolutely necessary to achieve progress."

"Neustar is pleased to continue its long-standing support of the identity community through the Kantara Initiative," added Davis. "Kantara plays a key role in providing an open, collaborative environment for individuals, vendors, and implementers to come together to create the important building blocks for the next evolutionary stage of network interactions. Making the Internet a safe and more individualized part of every day life is a core objective for Neustar and Kantara."

"The technologies of identity management are evolving as communications services - broadband and mobile, as well as traditional services - become an ever more critical enabler of consumer and business interactions," said Elisabeth Rainge, director of NGN Operations at IDC. "Neustar can add value to vital Kantara Initiative efforts around interoperability and portability from both the mobile and the fixed-line perspectives."

About Kantara Initiative
Kantara Initiative has been formed by Concordia Project, DataPortability Project, Information Card Foundation, Internet Society, Liberty Alliance, OpenLiberty.org and XDI.org. The Kantara Initiative membership structure has been organized to ensure that there are zero barriers to participation. Membership levels allow for maximum industry-wide participation and include Participant, Member and Trustee categories, which individuals and organizations join depending on the size of the organization and type of desired participation. The Kantara Initiative membership structure, levels, fees and governance model are outlined at http://bit.ly/8bBQQm. A complete membership and chair list is available at http://bit.ly/1C2u7a.

About Neustar

Neustar, Inc. solves complex communications challenges and provides market-leading, innovative solutions and directory services that enable trusted communication across networks, applications, and enterprises around the world. Visit Neustar online at www.neustar.biz.

SOURCE Kantara Initiative