German CA TrustCenter insolvent (fwd)

[J.A. Terranson]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 26 Sep 2005 08:35:12 +0200
From: Stephan Neuhaus <neuhaus at st.cs.uni-sb.de>
To: cryptography at metzdowd.com
Subject: German CA TrustCenter insolvent

Original article at http://www.heise.de/security/news/meldung/64224

It seems that the German TC TrustCenter GmbH (formerly TC TrustCenter
AG) is now insolvent.  TrustCenter was accredited to issue "qualified
signatures", which is what you need in Germany if you want your digital
signature to be as binding as your handwritten one.

It is as yet unclear why TrustCenter ran out of money, but the fact that
German banks sold their TrustCenter stocks to BeTrusted (now part of
Cybertrust) in 2004 shows that the banks had lost their confidence in PKI.

An interesting question is of course what happens with TrustCenter's
private keys.  Are they being auctioned off to the highest bidder?

Fun,

Stephan