[[_service_user_managed_access]]
= User-managed access

{project_name} Authorization Services is based on User-Managed Access or UMA for short. UMA is a specification that
enhances OAuth2 capabilities in the following ways:

* *Privacy*
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Nowadays, user privacy is becoming a huge concern, as more and more data and devices are available and connected to the cloud. With
UMA and {project_name}, resource servers can enhance their capabilities in order to improve how their resources are protected in respect
to user privacy where permissions are granted based on policies defined by the user.
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* *Party-to-Party Authorization*
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Resource owners (e.g.: regular end-users) can manage access to their resources and authorize other parties (e.g: regular end-users)
to access these resources. This is different than OAuth2 where consent is given to a client application acting on behalf of a user, with UMA
resource owners are allowed to consent access to other users, in a completely asynchronous manner.
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* *Resource Sharing*
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Resource owners are allowed to manage permissions to their resources and decide who can access a particular resource and how.
{project_name} can then act as a sharing management service from which resource owners can manage their resources.

{project_name} is a UMA 2.0 compliant authorization server that provides most UMA capabilities.

As an example, consider a user Alice (resource owner) using an Internet Banking Service (resource server) to manage her Bank Account (resource). One day, Alice decides
to open her bank account to Bob (requesting party), an accounting professional. However, Bob should only have access to view (scope) Alice's account.

As a resource server, the Internet Banking Service must be able to protect Alice's Bank Account. For that, it relies on {project_name}
Resource Registration Endpoint to create a resource in the server representing Alice's Bank Account.

At this moment, if Bob tries to access Alice's Bank Account, access will be denied. The Internet Banking Service defines a few default
policies for banking accounts. One of them is that only the owner, in this case Alice, is allowed to access her bank account.

However, Internet Banking Service in respect to Alice's privacy also allows her to change specific policies for the banking account. One of these
policies that she can change is to define which people are allowed to view her bank account. For that, Internet Banking Service relies on {project_name}
to provide to Alice a space where she can select individuals and the operations (or data) they are allowed to access. At any time, Alice
can revoke access or grant additional permissions to Bob.




