VeriSign, Intel team up on content security

By Ben Berkowitz

LOS ANGELES: Internet security company VeriSign Inc. and chip giant Intel Corp. on Tuesday said they will work together to build content security directly into new computers, potentially saving companies time and money and protecting confidential data from prying eyes.

VeriSign and Intel said that starting next year, "digital certificates," which authenticate a user's identity for purposes including encrypting and decrypting files, making payments, and accessing corporate networks, would come with Intel's new chip for laptops, code-named "Banias."

VeriSign said the deal was the first of its kind between a security company and a hardware company, and comes after repeated high-profile incidents in recent years in which corporate executives and government officials have lost laptops with sensitive information. Financial terms of the multiyear deal were not disclosed.

The "Banias" line, built from the ground-up, will make its debut early next year, and VeriSign said laptops with chips incorporating digital certificates and supporting the Banias line, as well as the accompanying software, would appear shortly thereafter.

"It's quicker, it's cheaper and it's lower-cost for the end user," John Weinschenk, vice president of the enterprise services group at VeriSign, told Reuters. "The end users don't really understand everything about security, nor do they have to," he added.

Weinschenk said the deal was limited to the Banias chipset, though he said the two sides were exploring possible expansion to other product lines. Beyond laptops, the Banias/digital certificate combination is being explored for devices like personal digital assistants, he said.

Weinschenk said the new security system would make such incidents less worrisome, as it would be easier to encrypt the contents of the hard drive and harder to access them without proper authentication.

Intel has said that part of the Banias chipset is processing for wireless communications, and Weinschenk said the digital certificates would come into play there as well, speeding up the identification process for users who want to access corporate intranets through private networks.

© Reuters