PKI Survey

["Donald Dunn" <dunnd@agr.gc.ca>]

The obstacles to PKI are the following:

1. Management does not seem to understand that a button cannot just be pushed and PKI is implemented.  They do not understand that an infrastructure of LRA's must be set up for the issuance of certificates, and that certificates should be issued in conjunction with an application and training for both.  They do not understand that these people must be PROPERLY trained and must follow explicit procedures in order to maintain the security of the system.

2. Ideally, PKI should be rolled out with a pervasive application.  However, with most of our pervasive applications, not all users require PKI, e.g. email.  We are currently rolling out for 10% of users for VPN.  A pervasive one would be an HR application which everyone uses, like PeopleSoft.

3. LRAs, senior management and users MUST understand the significance of a secure system and secure procedures to maintain it; they must understand the necessity of following the procedures, i.e. not to invalidate the security of the system.

Donald H.K. Dunn, M.A.,
Project Manager,________________________________gestionnaire de projets,
Information Technology Research,___Recherche en technologie de l'information
ASR, IMTS/IST, Room E203B,_______________ANR/GIST/ESI, Pièce E203B
Agriculture & Agri-Food Canada,_________Agriculture et Agroalimentaire Canada
930_Carling_Avenue,______________________________TEL:(613)_759-6993
Ottawa,_Canada,_________________________________FAX:(613)_759-6872
K1A_0C5__________________________________Internet:dunnd@agr.gc.ca
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