Information infrastructure for cryptography

Cryptography has become a technology of broad application, so the decisions about cryptography have increasingly broad effects on society. Applications of cryptography have evolved along with cryptography techniques. Originally cryptography was used to protect the confidentiality of communications; encryption is now also used to protect the confidentiality of electronic information and to protect the integrity and authenticity of both transmitted and stored information.

There is a need to internationally create an infrastructure to support encryption. This is important especially in the use of public-key encryption and digital signatures. However, there are many conflicting interests that make this effort a very demanding task. Main global challenges are:

International cryptography policies and regulations
Commercial cryptography
Key escrow encryption
Business requirements, use of cryptography with electronic payments
Privacy and trust.

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mtu@cs.hut.fi - 04 DEC 95