Insurance.com: Notes : Carty & Chisholm

Online Transaction Systems

Tom Carty
GTE CyberTrust

Doug Chisholm
Hewlett Packard

Tom Carty of GTE CyberTrust discussed consumer concerns with security as a hinderance to the expansion of Ecommerce. He presented the argument that digital signatures and Certification Authorities (technology of which GTE Cybertrust is a leading vendor) now affords:
    1. user ease of use, without intrusiveness;
    2. industry support and standardization;
    3. multiple solutions by one technology;
    4. reliable and predictable results;
    5. good resistance to conterfeiting and spoofing.

Tom reported the results of surveys indicating that the vast majority of Fortune 1000 companies expect to be utilizing public key encryption technology in Ecommerce by the Year 2000.

Doug Chisholm of Hewlett Packard reported that Hewlett Packard unplugged its last mainframe in 1997, and now fully relies upon distributed computing systems. Pointing out that H-P's intranet now carries some 15 terabytes of data each month, he expressed the opinion that the security and bandwidth was now available for a full scale shift to Net computing, once companies gained the will to make the shift.

Showing the fascinating H-P video about a seriously wired but fictitious 21st Century financial services company dubbed "First Global," Doug pointed out that the technologies used were presently available and approaching economic cost levels. He identified companies like State Farm, USAA, Travelers, Zurich, ING and some large banks as today being closest to "First Global."

Being big will be an advantage, according to Chisholm's view, but big companies have also the weakness of limited agility.