IEEE Sets Landmark Public-Key Crypto Standard
Reveals Inner Workings for Implementing RSA and Other Encryption Technologies
BEDFORD, Mass., March, XX, 2000 -- RSA Security Inc., the most trust name in e-security, joined with the IEEE today in announcing landmark standard for public-key cryptography, which, when published later this year, will offer a single, comprehensive reference guide for anyone wanting to implement a host of encryption technologies, including RSA, to add security to their applications. The IEEE P1363 Standard Specifications for Public Key Cryptography highlights the critical role these technologies now play in achieving security for a rapidly growing array of applications in wireless communications and the Internet, and will make it easier for companies building security into their applications to ensure they will work together.
The IEEE P1363 standard defines a full range of common public-key techniques such as key agreement, public-key encryption, digital signatures and identification for the principal cryptographic families, including discrete logarithms, integer factorization, and elliptic curves. It supports a wide range of application and security requirements, offering detailed descriptions of the main algorithms employed in today's most popular public-key cryptographic technologies, including the RSA public-key cryptosystem, Diffie-Hellman key agreement and elliptic curve cryptography, and will accommodate improvements in technology over time. The standard was given final approval by the IEEE Standards Board at its meeting in Singapore last January.
"IEEE P1363 is a landmark standard for public-key cryptography, bringing together many of the important developments of the past 20 years into a single reference document for the first time," said Bert Kaliski chief scientist at RSA Laboratories who chaired the IEEE P1363 working group from its inception in 1994 until recently. "It marks a significant milestone in the industry's development, and I want to thank all the members of the group, who represent a cross-section of the security industry, for their leadership and hard work in crafting this standard."
Other standards, like SSL or S/MIME, also employ public-key cryptography, but their focus is on protocols rather than the underlying algorithms themselves. IEEE P1363 brings the algorithms into one place for the first time, and promises to increase interoperability across protocols by providing a common reference for information about security and its implementation.
The RSA cryptosystem is by far the most widely used technology for achieving security. As the need for security become more widespread, however, especially for hardware-based implementations such as smart cards, chips for wireless applications, cryptographic accelerators, etc., many companies will need to create their own implementation of the RSA algorithms. Now, these companies have a basis for ensuring their implementations will work with others by following this standard.
The IEEE P1363 Standard Specifications for Public Key Cryptography is expected to be available in published form later this year. The IEEE P1363 working group's web page can be found at http://grouper.ieee.org/groups/1363.
The IEEE Standards Association (IEEE-SA) is an international membership organization serving today's industries with a complete portfolio of standards programs. The IEEE-SA is a major contributor to the IEEE, which is the world's largest technical professional society. IEEE-SA membership, through our IEEE association, promotes the engineering process by creating, developing, integrating, sharing and applying knowledge about electro- and information technologies and sciences for the benefit of humanity and the profession. More information is found at http://standards.ieee.org/sa-mem/index.html.
RSA Security Inc.
RSA Security Inc., The Most Trusted Name in e-Security™, helps organizations build secure, trusted foundations for e-businesses through its RSA SecurID? two-factor authentication, RSA BSAFE? encryption and RSA Keon™ public key management systems. As the global integration of Security Dynamics and RSA Data Security, RSA Security has the proven leadership, innovative technology and systems experience to address the changing security needs of e-business and bring trust to the new, online economy. RSA Security can be reached at www.rsasecurity.com.
# # # BSAFE and SecurID are registered trademarks, and Keon, RSA and The Most Trusted Name in e-Security are trademarks of RSA Security Inc. All other products and services mentioned are trademarks of their respective companies.