Assignment:
The Trust Infrastructure on the Internet - How do we secure and provide a legally binding level of trust on the Internet?
Write a research paper on digital signatures and certifying authorities including their relation to RSA Public and Private Key encryption. This research paper should be at least 800 to 1100 words and include references to the legal status in developed nations, the mathematics behind the technology, what are the major recognized authorities, and the likely future for this technology/business practice. The researcher should find the major US entities and how they relate and trust each other. On the legal topic, the researcher should find national and state laws and standards. You may also find laws from other countries and international organizations. Since many of these laws are now a decade or more old, we could also find legal interpretations of the law itself.
For this assigment, complete some basic research on the trust infrastructure of the internet. This research should include Digital Signatures, Certify Authorities, Public Key Infrastructure, RSA, and the laws that support these entities. Be sure to include the following relationships:
1) The differences between digital signatures and electronic signatures.
2) Identify a digital signature and how it might be better than a holographic signature (good old pen on paper).
3) Describe Certifying Authorities, identifying who they are and the whole PKI (Public Key Infrastructure).
4) Describe some of the laws that make this technology legally binding.
5) Discuss some of the math behind RSA/Public Key Cryptography.
In researching this topic, I hope that you can provide a clear explanation of how all this works to provide security, authentication, and non-repudiation in the online environment. This topic becomes more and more relevant every day as we do more and more business and live more and more of our lives online.
Please cite two or more authoritative sources. Government sources are a good source for the legal aspects of trust on the Internet. Reputable vendors (the companies that operate some of these services) often have good resources on how these entities work. Finally, research and industry standards organizations are also excellent sources.