Date time stamping with digital signature infrastructure

Abstract

Electronic commerce could be the domain way of making business in the near future. The growing dependence on internet services could be seen by the launching of new products by IT companies to facilitate e-economy or e-business. The security of transactions performed on the internet need to be address seriously to avoid malicious and unwanted internet fraudulent activities which could hinder the growth of internet commerce. Digital certificates are part of a Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) scheme, which is an enabling technology for building a trusted environment. PKI comprised of policies and procedures for establishing a secure method for exchanging information over a network environment. The Digital Signature Act 1997 (DSA 1997) facilitates the PKI implementation in Malaysia. Following the DSA 1997, Certification Authorities (CAS) were set up in Malaysia. Incorporating time and date stamping capabilities in digital signature implementations are required to prove at a later that the transactions existed at the stipulated date and time.[1] This paper describes effort on developing time and date stamping capabilities in a digital signature infrastructure. A digital signature generator with date time stamping has been developed to ensure a safe and trusted environment for e-business transactions. The trusted environment will ensure that only the people with a digital certificate are allowed to performed transactions with the applications. © 2002 IEEE.