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8. Deployments of the MATF Framework

This section preserves the RFC text for MATF, including federation trust model, metadata repository, public key pinning, JSON/JWS metadata, usage scenarios, deployments, security considerations, and JSON Schema.

8.  Deployments of the MATF Framework

   The MATF framework has proven its practical value and robustness
   through successful deployments in several environments.

8.1.  Skolfederation Moa

   Skolfederation Moa [Moa] is a federation designed to secure
   communication between digital educational resources and schools.
   MATF was developed to meet Moa's needs and enables secure data
   exchange for schools, municipalities, educational platforms, and
   services across Sweden.

   The community plays a crucial role in this type of federation.
   Members are active participants, and the federation operator ensures
   the federation runs smoothly and serves their needs.  Moa's success
   highlights the importance of collaboration, with members and the
   federation operator working together to maintain trust, security, and
   interoperability in the education sector.

   The deployment of MATF in the Swedish education sector has provided
   several key insights.  Maintaining an accurate registry of metadata
   ownership with reliable contact information is essential for
   troubleshooting and ensuring accountability.  The deployment also
   demonstrated the importance of setting reasonable expiration times
   for metadata.  Too short an expiration can hinder the ability to
   implement contingency plans for publishing new metadata during
   outages.

   Metadata validation is necessary to maintain a stable federation.
   While manual validation may be sufficient in the early stages of a
   federation, it becomes unmanageable as the federation scales.
   Without an automated validation process, incorrect metadata uploaded
   by members is likely to go undetected, leading to publication of
   incorrect metadata.

   The federation metadata signing private key is required to publish
   signed federation metadata.  In fallback scenarios, federation
   metadata may be retrieved from an alternate location, but publishing
   updated federation metadata requires access to the signing private
   key.  Therefore, secure and redundant management of the signing
   private key is necessary to support fallback mechanisms and reliable
   publication.  Recipients MUST validate the JWS signature using the
   federation signature verification key before using federation
   metadata, regardless of where it is obtained.

8.2.  Swedish National Agency for Education

   The Swedish National Agency for Education [SkolverketMATF] leverages
   MATF within its digital national test platform to establish a robust
   authentication mechanism.  The platform utilizes an API for client
   verification prior to secure data transfer to the agency's test
   service, ensuring the integrity and confidentiality of educational
   data.

8.3.  Sambruk's EGIL

   Sambruk's EGIL [EGIL], a platform providing digital services to
   municipalities, has successfully integrated the MATF framework.  This
   deployment demonstrates the framework's adaptability to support a
   wide range of digital service infrastructures.

   These deployments highlight the effectiveness of the MATF framework
   in enhancing security and interoperability within the educational
   sector.
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