Trustworthy contacts

[David Hansen]

On 9 Sep 00, at 11:12, George Foot wrote:

> But dual key methods are a technical innovation introduced by
> technical people

Most technical innovations are:-)

> which has lamentably been seized upon by
> energetic but shortsighted interests as a basis for a e-commerce
> framework which has been enshrined in law before it has been tested in
> practice. 

The alternative to a public key system for e-commerce would be a 
secret key system. I doubt very much if key management could be done 
with such a system.

Even if it was possible to make a secret key system work for e-
commerce I am not the only person who would abhor such a system. The 
idea that people should trust a "trusted" party to manage keys for 
them goes back to the days when people knew their place and were 
happy to be patronised by their betters.

The public key system has problems, but individuals can control these 
risks themselves if they want by key verification. That gives 
individual responsibility, something party politicians claim they are 
in favour of.




 David Hansen | davidh@spidacom.co.uk  | PGP email preferred
 Edinburgh    | CI$ number 100024,3247 | key number F566DA0E