Wednesday, January 29, 2003

European Commission Presses Microsoft to Alter its .NET Passport system

Following discussion with the European Commission, Microsoft agreed to implement a comprehensive package of data protection measures in its existing .NET Passport system. The most important result of the changes is that users will get much more information and choice as to which data they want to provide and under which conditions these data will be processed by Microsoft or the participating websites. The EC said on-line authentication services need to respect the data protection principles laid down in the 1995 Data Protection Directive and national laws.http://europa.eu.int

  • In August 2002, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission reached an agreement with Microsoft regarding security and privacy issues related to the .NET Passport system. The agreement called for the formalization, documentation and independent audit of Passport's security procedures.


  • Microsoft claims more than 200 million accounts for NET Passport and over 3.5 billion authentications per month. http://www.passport.net