# Network Identity Manager Concepts

The Network Identity Manager (NetIDMgr) organizes and manages credentials based on how they identify the user to network services. To this end, it is assumed that each credential will uniquely identify the user to a service as a single identity. When using Kerberos v5 the identity is the Kerberos principal name.

At it's core, NetIDMgr does not possess any knowledge about specific credentials that might be available to the user or how to manage them. It relies on several types of plug-ins to provide the information it needs, and to carry out credentials management tasks. One primary task is to identify and manage identities. These services are provided by a plug-in called the identity provider. Information about individual credentials are provided by credential providers. Other plug-ins may extend the functionality of these plug-ins or provide additional functionality for NetIDMgr.

The following topics provider further details:

- Identity
- Identity Provider
- Credentials Provider
- Credential