When encryption is also authentication...

[Mike Rosing]

On Wed, 29 May 2002, Curt Smith wrote:

> A digital signatures must involve a conscious decision by the
> signer to keep their part of an agreement.  I maintain that
> this requires user intervention to verify that the signer knew
> that they making an agreement - a "click of understanding" or
> pass phrase.

Yes of course - the point of signing something is a promise.  The act of
signing by pen is just being transformed into a different kind of act.
I think typing a pass phrase is better than a click, but we'll see what
the market develops.

Graham, there are many university profs interested in security on the net,
and the medical field is just starting to get into this in a big way.  I'm
not sure they are following consumers, but a web search on "medical
crypto" may find you a lot of interesting tidbits.

Patience, persistence, truth,
Dr. mike