<http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=109&STORY=/www/story/11-15-2004/0002456259&EDATE=> Certicom Announces Security Builder NSE (National Security Edition) Cryptographic toolkit enables government contractors to add security that meets NSA guidelines to protect mission-critical information MISSISSAUGA, ON, Nov. 15 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ - Government defence contractors got a helping hand today when Certicom Corp. (TSX: CIC), the authority for strong, efficient cryptography, announced Security Builder(R) NSE(TM). This developer toolkit enables organizations to build applications and devices that meet the field-of-use guidelines set out by the National Security Agency (NSA) to protect mission-critical national security information. According to the NSA, there are over one million high-grade devices in the U.S. Government today that will need to be replaced to include security based on Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC). At an Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) meeting on November 11, the NSA presented their requirements for strong security over the next 50 years and further information about their licensing agreement with Certicom for its ECC-based intellectual property. The NSA presentation can be found at http://www.machshav.com/~smb/saag-11-2004/ . In October 2003, the NSA selected elliptic curve cryptography (ECC) as the public-key cryptosystem to meet these new, stronger security requirements under its crypto modernization program. The agency purchased licensing rights for 26 ECC-based patents from Certicom for a particular field-of-use, defined as implementations of ECC that are over GF (p), where p is a prime greater than 2 to the power of 255. "This toolkit is a logical next phase for Certicom as it helps contractors meet the NSA guidelines for protecting the most critical government information. The agency has set out the guidelines and made the crypto licenses available to contractors. We're now providing a tool to help developers integrate optimized security features that meet those guidelines," said Ian McKinnon, president and CEO of Certicom. With this toolkit, organizations can be assured of proven implementations backed by Certicom, a team of cryptographic experts that has focused on optimizing public-key cryptosystems for almost two decades. The Security Builder NSE toolkit covers the technology that was part of the 26 patents licensed by the NSA plus optimized implementations that enable developers to meet the NSA field-of-use guidelines and FIPS 140-2 validation requirements. The toolkit, which is available in C code, includes: - Elliptic curve digital signature algorithm (ECDSA) (FIPS-validated) for digital signatures; - Elliptic curve Menezes-Qu-Vanstone (ECMQV) for key agreement and transport; - SHA-1 and SHA-2 (FIPS-validated) for hashing; - Advanced encryption standard (AES) (FIPS-validated) for strong encryption; - Random number generation (RNG) (also FIPS-validated); - Point compression for size and performance efficiencies; and - Support for Windows and Linux platforms. Security Builder NSE is part of the Certicom Security Architecture, which unifies all of Certicom's existing toolkits across a single API and enables developers to quickly migrate their applications to whichever cryptographic module is required. Pricing and Availability Security Builder NSE will be available in the first quarter of 2005 and priced at a one-time license fee with no royalties starting at US$50,000 per project in the field-of-use plus support and maintenance. A free license for the patents in the NSA field-of-use is available from the NSA or Certicom. About Certicom Certicom Corp. (TSX:CIC) is the authority for strong, efficient cryptography required by software vendors and device manufacturers to embed security in their products. Adopted by the US Government's National Security Agency (NSA), Certicom technologies for Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC) provide the most security per bit of any known public key scheme, making it ideal for constrained environments. Certicom products and services are currently licensed to more than 300 customers including Motorola, Oracle, Research In Motion, Terayon, Texas Instruments and Unisys. Founded in 1985, Certicom is headquartered in Mississauga, ON, Canada, with offices in Ottawa, ON; Reston, VA; San Mateo, CA; and London, England. Visit http://www.certicom.com . Certicom, Certicom Security Architecture, Certicom CodeSign, Security Builder, Security Builder Middleware, Security Builder API, Security Builder Crypto, Security Builder SSL, Security Builder PKI, and Security Builder GSE are trademarks or registered trademarks of Certicom Corp. Intel is registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. All other companies and products listed herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders. Except for historical information contained herein, this news release contains forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties. Actual results may differ materially. Factors that might cause a difference include, but are not limited to, those relating to the acceptance of mobile and wireless devices and the continued growth of e-commerce and m-commerce, the increase of the demand for mutual authentication in m-commerce transactions, the acceptance of Elliptic Curve Cryptography (ECC) technology as an industry standard, the market acceptance of our principal products and sales of our customer's products, the impact of competitive products and technologies, the possibility of our products infringing patents and other intellectual property of fourth parties, and costs of product development. Certicom will not update these forward-looking statements to reflect events or circumstances after the date hereof. More detailed information about potential factors that could affect Certicom's financial results is included in the documents Certicom files from time to time with the Canadian securities regulatory authorities. 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