End to End Trust Initiative Continues Dialog for Web Security

Craig Mundie, Microsoft Chief Research and Strategy Officer, used his keynote address at RSA Conference 2008 to introduce End to End Trust, a concept built around authenticating identities and securing Web-based transactions and communications. The Trust initiative must emerge as a vendor neutral approach with close alignment between technologies, social, political, and economic forces.

A white paper entitied Establishing End to End Trust outlines the discussion. The white paper spells out a vision of how End to End Trust can be achieved through a "trusted stack" that features security rooted in the hardware, trusted operating system, trusted applications, trusted people, and trusted data. The white paper focuses heavily on establishing trusted identities on the Internet without abolishing the concept of anonymity.

The idea is to open a dialog with partners and competitors about how to build Trustworthy Computing for the Internet. To that end, we have established a public discussion forum where anyone concerned about online security and privacy can let their voice be heard.