September 7 997 Network Security

was one of the co-authors of S/MIME.

Furthermore, the S/MIME capability encrypts E-mail at the server, allowing users to send E-mail normally. ‘As it goes from one destination to another, the data gets encrypted automatically. You are adding security to your messages without requiring your users to know anything about how to encrypt messages,” Mr Wong said.

The product is an SMTP relay. meaning that it supports the Internet mail protocol. “You can drop the product into any SMTP messaging network,” Mr Wong said. World-Talk’s E-mail firewall product would likely sit in between the Internet and the E-mail servers. Netscape and Microsoft and Lotus use S/MIME in their products. WorldSecure products support products that use S/MIME.

One analyst said he expected that in time, all the popular next generation E-mail servers will include the same immunization properties offered by Worldtalk.

“But today, by dropping a box on the organization side of a firewall, you are putting security on all E-mail that is received. You don’t have to wait for Microsoft to upgrade its system,” said Mr lra Machefsky, a president at Giga Information Group market research firm in Santa Clara.

As E-mail security becomes more focal in the minds of users who crave their privacy, competing companies are constantly developing products that are more secure. For example, one of the more popular E-mail security providers, PGP Software in Redwood Shores, California, develops encryption and digital

signature software for E-mail applications,

Said Mr Paul Lanyi, senior public relations manager at Pretly Good Privacy Inc. in Redwood City, “If someone is trying to get data from within the company, a firewall w/II not protect at that level. PGP software protects at the root.”

Distributing encrypted messages more securely

Charlie Breitrose

A company specializing in electronic software distribution was awarded a patent for its unique way of presenting and selling software recently. Digital Delivery’s patent covers the way encryption and decryption keys are created, managed and used. The technology allows users to distribute information on CD-ROM or over the Internet. as well as giving them an easy way to decrypt software for the software publisher.

The technology is used in two of the company’s products, TitleBuilder which is designed for software vendors, and recently introduced Confidential Courier, designed for corporate intranets.

Digital Delivery’s chief executive and founder, Mark Hastings said that corporations are facing a troublesome dilemma as we move deeper into the age of information technology. While it makes it quicker and more inexpensive to distribute information to employees, corporations risk allowing sensitive information falling into the wrong hands.

“Confidential Courier is aimed at helping companies maintain control over access to corporate

information’, Hastlngs said. TitleBuilder is not a new product, It was flrst released In 1994, two years after the company was founded, according to Hastlngs.

‘It is essentially a database and a way to represent Information you want to sell as items - basic object-orientated stuff”, he said.

The unique thing is how three different technologies are brought together. With TitleBuilder, customers get a single CD-ROM disc which contains everything needed to preview, order and receive the software. TitleBuilder comes with three main components: a builder, a viewer and a key generator. Each is used by a different audience.

The builder is used by the software provider to organize the software and marketing collateral to put on the CD-ROM. At the same time it defines the encryption process and the key generation strategies. When the customer receives the disk the viewer he or she can use the graphical-user interface to preview optional multimedia product demonstrations. If any of the products seem desirable to the user they may be dragged and dropped on to an order pad, allowing the customer to securely order and purchase products via the phone, fax or Internet.

To get the product, the customer sends in the request and the software vendor sends the customer the key to decrypt and access certain products from the CD. Each key is unlque, and can be made to open which ever items are requested, while denying access to others. And, the key is unique to the each customer, so someone with another disc from the vendor cannot use the password, too.

0 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd