Tuesday, March 2, 2010

Microsoft Advances its End to End Trust Vision with U-Prove

Microsoft is continuing to develop its End to End Trust vision by releasing a community technology preview of its U-Prove technology. This enables online providers to better protect privacy and enhance security through the minimal disclosure of information in online transactions.


Microsoft is providing core portions of the U-Prove intellectual property under the Open Specification Promise, as well as releasing open source software development kits in C# and Java editions. Charney encouraged the industry, developers and IT professionals to develop identity solutions that help protect individual privacy.


The company also shared details about a new partnership with the Fraunhofer Institute for Open Communication Systems in Berlin on an interoperability prototype project integrating U-Prove and the Microsoft identity platform with the German government's future use of electronic identity cards.


Microsoft also released Forefront Identity Manager 2010, a part of its Business Ready Security strategy. Forefront Identity Manager enables policy-based identity management across diverse environments, empowers business customers with self-service capabilities, and provides IT professionals with rich administrative tools.


In a keynote address at the RSA conference in San Francisco, Scott Charney, corporate vice president of Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing Group, explained how the company's vision for End to End Trust applies to cloud computing, detailed progress toward a claims-based identity metasystem, and called for public and private organizations alike to prevent and disrupt cybercrime.


In addition, Charney discussed Microsoft's Operation b49, a Microsoft-led initiative to neutralize the Waledac botnet, Charney stated that while focusing on security and privacy fundamentals and threat mitigation remains necessary, the industry needs to be more aggressive in blunting the impact of cybercriminals. Operation b49 is an example of how the private sector can get more creative in its collective approach to fighting criminals online.
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