Open Source Development of Security Products Possible Worldwide, Enhancing
Security and Privacy for E-Commerce and Communication; Sun-Netscape Alliance
To Contribute Source Code for Security Libraries
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Jan. 18 /PRNewswire/ -- mozilla.org, the
organization that manages the open source development of the Mozilla browser
(http://www.mozilla.org), today announced that it will be offering security
technology as part of its open source project, adding a critical feature set
to the Mozilla open source browser. The announcement coincides with the new US
government export regulations that allow US-based developers to export
encryption source code. mozilla.org can now provide free access to security
source code worldwide, enable ongoing contributions and improvements by the
development community and include security source code in mozilla.org
releases. In addition, the Sun-Netscape Alliance announced plans to contribute
the source code of its security libraries, including Network Security Services
(NSS) and Personal Security Manager (PSM), to the Mozilla code base. This
software comprises the core security architecture for most of the Alliance
server products and Netscape client software. mozilla.org expects the first
contributions of code from the Alliance to be made available by
March 31, 2000, with continuing contributions thereafter.
"This contribution provides Mozilla with a high-quality open source
security component for the browser. The benefit to the industry will only
increase as security contributions to mozilla.org increase, enabling secure
commerce and enhanced privacy around the world," said Mitchell Baker, chief
lizard wrangler at mozilla.org. "Netscape (R) has been a corporate leader in
advocating change to export restrictions on encryption and mozilla.org is
gratified to see the Sun-Netscape Alliance continue this tradition by
announcing its contribution of NSS and PSM to mozilla.org."
Security technology will now benefit more than ever from the open source
development model. US-based open source developers can enjoy the benefits of
security technology and developers can collaborate internationally to develop
security technology for worldwide use. The Mozilla community will see benefits
in both browser technology and in component technologies available to
developers. The source code contributed by the Sun-Netscape Alliance can be
used to provide Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) support in the Mozilla browser,
allowing users to shop online while protecting the privacy of their sensitive
data.
The libraries are highly modular and are therefore usable outside of the
context of a web browser. This presents the opportunity to develop innovative
new security-enabled products and services. Developers can do so quickly,
internationally and with the confidence that the security technologies have
been tested both by the Sun-Netscape Alliance and through the strength of the
open source development method. Now mozilla.org can provide developers with a
security-enabled Mozilla browser and with internationally usable,
cross-platform security libraries for use with other technologies.
"The ability to include security technology in internationally available
open source projects is a change of enormous importance to the open source
community," said Matthew Szulik, president and CEO of Red Hat. "The
Sun-Netscape Alliance's donation of source code to the Mozilla project
verifies that open source computing makes sense for businesses, developers and
end-users, and we anticipate that the Mozilla project will continue to provide
users with the benefits that open source has to offer."
"With the release of this source code we are closer to the goal of having
a complete set of highly secure and high quality open source Web client and
server software," said Brian Behlendorf, president of the Apache Software
Foundation and chief technology officer for Collab.Net. "As a result of the
new US export regulations and initiatives like this, I expect that
commercial-grade security will come to be a standard part of all open source
software."
Personal Security Manager is a client-independent security module that
performs security operations on behalf of an application. These operations
include setting up an SSL connection, object signing and signature
verification, certificate management including issuance and revocation, and
other common Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) functions. Personal Security
Manager will perform security functions for the latest release of the Mozilla
web browser. Application developers can take advantage of the Personal
Security Manager code base instead of writing their own security functions.
Network Security Software (NSS) is a security software development package
that provides easy-to-integrate, Internet-ready SSL and public-key security
capabilities.
mozilla.org (http://www.mozilla.org) is the group founded by Netscape
Communications with responsibility for making Mozilla a successful open source
project; it exists to support the entire Mozilla community. mozilla.org
provides a central point of contact and community for those interested in
using or improving the Mozilla code base.
NOTE: Product and brand names are trademarks of their respective owners.
SOURCE Netscape Communications Corporation
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