Information technology - Software asset management - Part 2: Software identification tag

This Standard establishes specifications for tagging software to optimize its identification and management.

This part of ISO/IEC 19770 applies to the following.

a) Tag producers: these organizations and/or tools create software identification (SWID) tags for use by others in the market. A tag producer may be part of the software creator organization, the software licensor organization, or be a third-party organization. These organizations and/or tools can broadly be broken down into the following categories.

1. Platform providers: entities responsible for the computer or hardware device and/or associated operating system, virtual environment, or application platform, on which software may be installed or run. Platform providers which support this part of ISO/IEC 19770 may additionally provide tag management capabilities at the level of the platform or operating system.
2. Software providers: entities that create, license, or distribute software. For example, software creators, independent software developers, consultants, and repackagers of previously manufactured software. Software creators may also be in-house software developers.
3. Tag tool providers: entities that provide tools to create software identification tags. For example, tools within development environments that generate software identification tags, or installation tools that may create tags on behalf of the installation process, and/or desktop management tools that may create tags for installed software that did not originally have a software identification tag.

b) Tag consumers: these tools and/or organizations utilize information from SWID tags and are typically broken down into the following two major categories:

1. software consumers: entities that purchase, install, and/or otherwise consume software;
2. IT discovery and processing tool providers: entities that provide tools to collect, store, and process software identification tags. These tools may be targeted at a variety of different market segments, including software security, compliance, and logistics.

ISO/IEC 19770-2:2015 does not prescribe Information Technology Asset Management (ITAM) or other IT-related processes required for reconciliation of software entitlements with software identification tags or other IT requirements