Fergie's Tech Blog

Illinois Puts Pizazz Back in PKI?

Ellen Messmer writes on NetworkWorld:

In 1999 Illinois placed a big security bet on public-key infrastructure for e-commerce, but three years ago its PKI project faltered as state agencies foundered badly when issuing the digital certificates to citizens.

It wasn’t supposed to turn out that way. The state’s landmark Electronic Commerce Security Act had given digitally signed documents an equal legal status to wet-signature paper ones in 1999, putting Illinois on the cusp of the PKI revolution. “Over the next 18 months we hope to distribute over a million digital IDs to citizens and businesses to enable them to do business with the state of Illinois as an integrated secure Web-driven government,” proclaimed then-Governor George Ryan.

More here.

Note: This is worth watching -- even a small push in the PKI space to gain some traction would be a great thing. - ferg

posted by Fergie @ 7/11/2007 05:27:00 PM