From the beginning of February 2019, the University of Lucerne will be moving over to the new "edu-ID" authentication and authorisation infrastructure from SWITCH. Each edu-ID is linked to an individual user: it can be used for multiple universities and is retained after completion of studies or employment.

SWITCHaai is currently used to log in to various services such as OLAT, UniPortal or EZproxy. The SWITCH edu-ID builds on and expands the tried-and-tested SWITCHaai. It will now support self-enrolment and recognition, and enables easier access to university services for a wider circle of users such as alumni, postgraduates, partners or visitors. In the future, people studying or working at multiple universities will only require a single account.

The transition from SWITCHaai to SWITCH edu-ID will take place in multiple stages. New students will apply for a SWITCH edu-ID account as part of the enrolment process for the 2019 spring semester. Existing students and employees must create a SWITCH edu-ID account by the end of January 2019 and link it up with their SWITCHaai account. The online platform migrate2eduid.unilu.ch is available for this purpose. From the beginning of February 2019, logging in to services such as the UniPortal, EZproxy and OLAT will only be possible using a SWITCH edu-ID — the deadline originally planned for the beginning of January has been put back a month.

For the time being, the SWITCH edu-ID will only be used for online services such as OLAT, UniPortal or EZproxy. UNI accounts (e.g. MusterH for employees or S11-111-111 for students) are still used to log in to personal staff computers, email (including webmail) and eduroam. UNI accounts and the SWITCH edu-ID operate independently, so the access data for these will not be the same.

Alumni access to the AlumniPortal via a SWITCH edu-ID should be introduced at some point in 2019, and full roll-out to Swiss universities should be completed by 2020.

The SWITCH edu-ID will be operated by SWITCH like SWITCHaai. SWITCH provides universities with information and communication technology services.