VeriSign takes aim at PKI ease of use

SAN FRANCISCO -- VeriSign Inc. today unveiled a series of new products, services and partnerships that may go a long way toward solving the thorny issue of PKI usability.

The Mountain View, Calif., public-key infrastructure provider announced at the RSA Security Conference here a next-generation PKI service dubbed 2nd-Generation PKI. The traditionally difficult management aspects of PKI, such as certificate processing, revocation list management and other validation functions, which previously had to be created with software toolkits, are now built into the new architecture.

The system is enabled by VeriSign's XML key management specification (or XKMS), which today was submitted to the World Wide Web Consortium for standardization. Baltimore Technologies, IBM, Hewlett-Packard Co. and others joined in support of XKMS, which enables easier integration of security and trust services between online applications.

2nd-Generation PKI is available now.

VeriSign also announced today a strategic partnership with Access360, a maker of policy-based provisioning software, to create Access360.net, a "trusted managed service" that will help administrators manage user access and security privileges.

The service will be available this quarter.

In other announcements, VeriSign unveiled enhancements to its Entitlements Management Service and new trade settlement services in conjunction with SurePay.