Authenticated web feed access standard?

["Steven Clift" <slc@publicus.net>]

Is there a standard that defines how news aggregators should request
access to web feeds behind a login/password?

Our few private groups - http://forums.e-democracy.org - generate web
feeds which may be read by default browser-based feed readers and
there is no problem to display them if someone stays logged in via the
browser.

However, I'd like to have the developer of the open source GroupServer
- http://groupserver.org - tool explore giving authenticated access to
Bloglines and other users of aggregators that supposedly support this
kind of access.

Steven Clift
E-Democracy.Org