SAN JOSE, Calif., RSA Conference 2000, Jan. 19 /PRNewswire/ --
VeriSign, Inc. (Nasdaq: VRSN), the leading provider of Internet trust
services, today announced strong support from its Global Affiliate Network for
its new suite of wireless technologies and services, announced earlier this
week at the RSA Conference 2000. VeriSign's Global Affiliate Network consists
of an expanding group of international service providers -- currently
numbering more than 20 -- which utilize common technology, operating practices
and infrastructure to deliver interoperable trust services over the Internet.
Today's support adds to the broad range of wireless industry alliances which
VeriSign unveiled earlier this week with leaders including BellSouth,
InfoSpace.com, Gemplus, Motorola, Research In Motion, RSA Security, Sonera
SmartTrust and others (see related press releases at http://www.verisign.com).
"Our network of Global Affiliates includes some of the world's leading
telecommunications companies and e-commerce service providers," said
Richard Yanowitch, executive vice president of Worldwide Marketing for
VeriSign. "By combining their expertise, powerful brands and strong customer
relationships with our new wireless technologies and services, we are well
positioned to enable a wide range of trusted wireless applications on a global
basis."
VeriSign's wireless trust infrastructure will enable a new generation of
wireless applications, including mobile banking, stock trading, health care
and B2B transactions. Earlier this week, VeriSign announced a new suite of
innovative technologies, services and alliances specifically tailored to the
unique architecture of the wireless Internet. These technologies -- the
Wireless Personal Trust Agent (PTA), short-lived wireless server certificates,
gateway-assisted SSL, and network-enabled PKI -- form the core of new wireless
trust services for subscribers, developers, servers/gateways, enterprises,
network operators and service providers. Several of these services are
available now with others, including a platform for VeriSign Global
Affiliates, to be introduced later in 2000. More on VeriSign's new wireless
technologies and trust services can be found in a white paper entitled "Secure
Wireless E-Commerce with PKI from VeriSign," also available on the VeriSign
Web site.
Global Leaders Show Worldwide Interest in Wireless Trust Services
arabtrust.com
"Countries in the Middle East are moving quickly towards full adoption of
wireless e-commerce," said Alya Al-Bahar, Managing Director of arabtrust.com.
"The Bank of Kuwait, for instance, has deployed GSM banking services, enabling
clients to receive bank account information, weather, and other data
wirelessly. A proposal has been submitted in the Kuwaiti parliament to
mandate the use of digital signatures for all communications between the
government of Kuwait and its citizens."
BT TrustWise
"BT is already demonstrating applications that work on WAP mobile phones
at its laboratories at Adastral Park," said Michele Mooney of BT TrustWise.
"Mobile phone ownership and Internet access are both increasing substantially
in the UK, and there is growing usage of SMS messaging amongst mobile phone
users. All this points to the enormous potential for WAP enabled
applications. BT TrustWise is working with VeriSign to add the wireless PKI
security which will be required to underpin these mobile applications."
Certplus
"Building trust in the wireless world is a strong demand of our
customers," said Jacques Pantin CEO of Certplus, the leading trust and PKI
operator in France and a VeriSign affiliate. "Certplus is now able to answer
the great demand for wireless secure applications in Europe with the support
of our shareholders: Gemplus, the number one SIM card manufacturer in the
world is now delivering a powerful PKI-SIM card solution. France Telecom, a
leading GSM operator in Europe is among the first to offer WAP services. We
are confident that VeriSign will take the leading role in wireless PKI and
brings us its strong experience and solutions."
CrossCert
In Korea there are five wireless mobile carriers with 22 million mobile
users as of September 1999. "We are very pleased through our affiliation with
VeriSign to be able to offer globally recognized trusted PKI services to our
current telecommunications clients. As wireless e-commerce becomes readily
accepted, CrossCert and VeriSign will be there providing the necessary trust
infrastructure," said Jay Bae, vice president of CrossCert, VeriSign's
affiliate in Korea.
eSign
"Australia has one of the highest penetrations of mobile phones and
Internet usage in the world. The new wireless trust services announced by
VeriSign mean that Australian consumers can now take full advantage of secure
e-commerce services quickly and easily," said Gregg Rowley, Managing Director
of VeriSign's Australian affiliate, eSign. "Mobile phones are both an ideal
way for consumers to utilize many Web services and a convenient device for the
storage and use of digital certificates. These new wireless trust services
from VeriSign are the 'missing link' needed to enable secure and convenient
consumer e-commerce transactions such as such as e-banking and e-brokering."
HiTRUST
Another example of the growing support worldwide for wireless trust
services is Taiwan's 10 million mobile subscribers, which accounts for 45% of
the country's 22 million residents. It is anticipated that growth is to reach
12 million subscribers by the end of 2000. All Taiwan's wireless telecom
companies are planning to upgrade their system from GSM (9.6Kbps) to broadband
GPRS (115Kbps) within the next two years and are currently already providing
mobile banking services. Twenty percent of these subscribers will make use of
these services by the end of year 2000. "HiTRUST has the opportunity to
provide VeriSign's wireless trust infrastructure to secure these millions of
transactions," said Johnny Ho, Vice President, HiTRUST, the leading provider
of Internet trust services in Taiwan.
INTERSAT SA
"It's a great opportunity for INTERSAT SA to provide VeriSign's wireless
trust services to the mobile users and mobile operators in Greece and the
other countries of Southeastern Europe," said Stavros Karaguloglou, vice
chairman and general manager of INTERSAT SA. "The market is demanding
services that will provide trust for mobile communications and transactions in
the new era of anytime, anywhere e-commerce."
KPN Telecom
VeriSign's Affiliate, KPN Telecom, is the largest mobile operator in the
Netherlands with more than 3.5 million subscribers. In conjunction with
BellSouth, KPN recently acquired Germany's third largest mobile operator,
Eplus, and recently launched its Minfo service which offers WAP services to
mobile subscribers including Nokia's WAP phone for access to stock exchange
and travel information. "With the rapid growth in wireless e-commerce, there
is a clear need for wireless security," said Jeroen Borgsteede, senior product
manager CA services at KPN Telecom. "VeriSign's product and service platform
already provides the basis for trusted e-commerce over the wired Internet, and
it is logical to look to them to provide the same level of trust for wireless
transactions."
Roccade
In addition, Roccade Megaplex, member of the PinkRoccade group and
VeriSign Affiliate in the Benelux countries, is actively developing
applications for WAP enabled devices like cell phones. In cooperation with
Roccade Finance (which is a major application development organization in the
financial industry) the first applications will be in the online investment
field with a major Dutch financial institution. Roccade Megaplex offers
digital certificates for strong authentication and encryption for these WAP
devices. "As a European trusted third party, the wireless PKI infrastructure
for enabling e-commerce with these devices is based on local legislation which
makes these transactions non-repudiable and enables a future of hand held
e-commerce using mobile devices," said Haydar Cimen, Product Manager, TTP
Services, PinkRoccade.
SACA
"As VeriSign's South African affiliate SACA is working with leading banks
like Nedbank to provide WAP-enabled digital certificates for banking
applications such as transaction services, payments, transfers and enquiries,"
said Tim Ellis, Managing Director of the South African Certification Agency.
"SACA already provides Nedbank with global server certificates for Internet
banking, so it's a natural move for them to use us to go wireless."
Telia Electronic Commerce
"As the leader in Internet trust services, VeriSign is once again
demonstrating its strength in providing open, interoperable solutions for
customers," said Peter Lundgren, SVP at Telia Electronic Commerce.
"As an affiliate of VeriSign in Scandinavia -- the most advanced e-commerce
market in the world -- and as a provider of wireless telecommunications
services, we are especially pleased that customers using all major WAP server
platforms will be able to obtain WAP server certificates from VeriSign's new
service."
VPN Tech
"VPN Tech anticipates rapid adoption of wireless PKI by its large
installed base of mobile users," said Claude Perreault, president of VPN Tech,
Inc. "Our customers have expressed a desire for a trusted infrastructure to
service the wireless Internet, VeriSign's innovation in this regard will
stimulate the growth of electronic commerce in Canada."
VeriSign Affiliates
VeriSign Affiliates combine VeriSign's expertise in both the Wired and
Wireless Internet with their own e-commerce services to serve customers in
their local language, currency, and legal system. Key e-commerce applications
that require Internet trust services include employee intranets, supply chain
extranets, virtual private networks (VPNs), and large scale e-commerce
applications such as e-banking, e-brokerage, and e-healthcare, soon to be
available wirelessly.
There are now more than 20 VeriSign international Affiliates delivering
co-branded digital certificate services under common trust principles. They
include: in Europe, British Telecommunications (U.K.), Certplus (France),
Comparex Holdings (Germany), KPN Telecom (the Netherlands), Roccade Megaplex
(the Netherlands, Belgium, and Luxembourg), Adacom (Greece and the Balkans),
INTERSAT SA (Greece, Cyprus, and Southeastern Europe), Telia (Nordic and
Baltic countries) and an affiliate in Ireland; in Asia, VeriSign Japan,
HiTRUST (Taiwan) and CrossCert (Korea); in Australia, eSign; in Africa, SACA
(South Africa); in the Americas, AT&T (U.S.), VPN Tech (Canada), CIBC
(Canada), Certisign (Brazil) and Certisur (Argentina); and arabtrust.com in
the Middle East.
VeriSign, Inc.
VeriSign, Inc. is the leading provider of Internet trust services
-- including authentication, validation and payment -- needed by Web sites,
enterprises and e-commerce service providers to conduct trusted and secure
electronic commerce and communications over IP networks. VeriSign's trust
services for Web sites, developers and individuals are available through
http://www.verisign.com and through a growing number of ISPs and Web hosting
companies. The company's digital certificate services for enterprises and
electronic commerce service providers are available through regional account
representatives, resellers, and global affiliates.
This press release contains forward-looking statements, including but not
limited to the introduction of new products and services, the ability of
alliances described above to achieve the beneficial synergies anticipated and
the future of the markets and industries described above. Such statements
involve a number of risks and uncertainties. Among the important factors that
could cause actual results to differ materially from those indicated by such
forward-looking statements are delays in product development, technical
difficulties, competitive pressures, changes in customer requirements, failure
to develop or maintain strategic alliance relationships, market acceptance of
new technologies and technological changes in the computer industry. More
information about potential factors which could affect VeriSign, see the final
prospectus for VeriSign's follow-on offering dated January 26, 1999 and
VeriSign's reports filed with the SEC. VeriSign assumes no obligation to
update the forward-looking information contained in this press release.
NOTE: VeriSign is a registered trademark exclusively licensed to VeriSign
Inc. OnSite is a service mark of VeriSign Inc. All other trademarks are
properties of their respective owners.
SOURCE VeriSign, Inc.
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Related links:
http://www.verisign.com
CONTACT:
Jeff Wenker of Edelman Public Relations
Worldwide, 650-429-2768, or jeff_wenker@edelman.com for VeriSign
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