Driving Forces
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Driving Forces (Tom Holleman)

The Growth of Electronic Commerce

The potential of electronic commerce over the internet is the single biggest factor driving the need for digital certificates. The electronic commerce market is predicted to be the fastest growing market in history.9 If market research is to be believed, as much as $2 billion of revenues will be up for grabs next year (2000) as electronic commerce goes into higher gear.1

Although it has already experienced some of this growth in the last few years, it cannot continue without improvements in the security of it's transactions. And digital certificates are expected to be the cornerstone of this enhanced security.3

"Public key cryptography (digital certificates) has been around for a long time, and it might accurately have been described as a solution looking for a problem," said D. James Bidzos, president and chief executive officer of RSA Data Security Inc., the leader in the data encryption industry. "Only recently has the problem -- on-line commerce -- presented itself"1

Companies and their networks are becoming increasingly connected to their branch offices, remote employees, and the rest of the world. Below are some of the technologies involved:

Extranets: Extranets, designed to allow for limited access to business information and resources, are becoming an increasingly popular way to connect with partners and suppliers.
Intranets: Intranets have been proven as an effective means to provide employee's access to the corporations information resources right from their desktop.
VPNs: One way to implement intranets and extranets is to use virtual private networks. VPNs use the public telecommunication infrastructure to implement a private data network instead of a system of owned or leased lines that can only be used by one company.

The viability of these technologies depends heavily on the security that can be provided to the information they carry. This needed security can be accomplished through the use of digital certificates.

 
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