Patent ID: 7363339

Claim:
A method for identifying members of a group, comprising the steps of: determining dynamic members of a first user group based on a rule that defines dynamic membership for said first user group, wherein said rule is stored in a dynamic rule attribute of an identity profile of said first user group and wherein said first user group includes one or more static members and an identification of each of said static members is stored in a static member attribute for said identity profile of said first user group; storing an identification of each of said dynamic members of said first user group wherein said identification of each of said dynamic members is stored in said static member attribute for said identity profile of said first user group; determining nested members of said first user group; storing an identification of each of said nested members of said first user group; receiving a request to report members of said first user group, said request is received subsequent to said step of storing; and reporting said dynamic members and said nested members of said first user group in response to said request, said reporting of said dynamic members is performed based on said stored identification of said dynamic members and said reporting of said nested members is performed based on said stored identification of said nested members.