Written by charismathics®, the world leader in PKI middleware, today announced iEnigma for Windows Mobile, a software application for smart phones. With iEnigma, the user turns his smart phone into a smart card. There is no need for additional hardware, the application completely replaces formerly required hardware and keeps your digital identity securely within the smart phone.
Upgradable to regular PKI smart cards, iEnigma is compliant to all existing identity management schemes and does not require any change to processes or user habits. According to charismathics, the product “is very likely to change the way we all use computers in the future”. The product will soon support Blackberry, Android and Apple as well. iEnigma is also available as authentication engine for third party applications and services so that banks and other service providers are able to use it in combination with their services.
The idea seems as revolutionary as the concept of the product. Instead of using a USB stick or a plastic card in current access control systems – just keep your smart phone with you. Getting close to doors or to computers, it will authenticate the phone and let you access wirelessly. Sven Gossel, Managing Director of charismathics says: “We are still at the beginning of all the ideas around this product. Our aim is to make life easier for the organizations and users. But our vision is way beyond this step.”
On the enterprise side, iEnigma works with all existing identity management tools and embeds into running schemes. On the banking side, it fully supports NFC payment standards. And on the individual side, instead of a mystery happening in the background, the user is in full and visual control of all his credentials. iEnigma stores the individual user credentials inside the smart phone, bridges them into the computer via Bluetooth or WIFI and allows to maintain the product over the air interface or when connected to the computer. It also makes another user habit a real benefit: smart phones are very personal devices. This is why smart phones aren´t lost as often as your company ID card, or your ATM card.
The communication in-between the phone and the computer is fully encrypted, the interfaces fully standardized and the application obviously supports smart card chips inside the phone. Credentials are stored in the SIM card of the phone, inside dedicated security storage areas or on separate devices, such as micro SD cards.
The decision on where to store them is with the provider or with the individual – the application is fully configurable. By definition, the product also provides secure channel messaging and secure PIN entry – features that are usually locking the buyer to a single vendor or expensive to implement.
The other benefit is the combination with applications running on the smart phone itself: iEnigma supports VPN and email clients, browsers as well as document management software. This provides unlimited security regardless of your mobility and your point of Internet access.
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