Japan Eyes Encryption For Secure Mobile CommunicationsJapan Eyes Encryption For Secure Mobile Communications

TOKYO — A coalition of government, industry and research organizations in Japan has proposed the adoption of a common platform based on Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) authentication for higher security on mobile-phone networks, bypassing ID- and password-based security.

The group announced Tuesday (Jan. 23) that it has developed the technology with the aim of providing a common platform for secure mobile-phone communications in Japan. The group comprises the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT), the mobile IT Forum (mITF), Hitachi, NTT Docomo, KDDI R&D Laboratories and NEC Corp.,

All three major carriers in Japan have been members of mITF. If the common PKI platform succeeds, people will eventually use mobile phones for identification, said Yutaka Yasuda, general manager of the corporate technology sector, who is acting as the chairman of the Mobile Commerce Committee of the mobile IT Forum.

Hitachi, Docomo, KDDI and NEC have been working for three years to develop the mobile-security technology, funded with about $5 million from NICT.

While PKI authentication is penetrating the PC network sector, ID and password techniques are still the main security schemes on mobile-phone networks. And although a secure technology is needed for mobile phones, there are limitations and requirements that are peculiar to mobile-phone networks, said Satoru Tezuka, director of the 7th Research department of Hitachi's Systems Development Laboratory. The company is acting as research leader for this project.

Four companies collaborated to develop the component technologies. Docomo and KDDI, the top two carriers in Japan, worked to prepare standard, interoperable authentication certificates. Hitachi and NEC provided technologies that solve mobile-phone-specific problems such as authentication interruption caused by a disconnection.

The mobile IT Forum (mITF), an industry association consisting of 77 mobile-phone-centric companies and organizations, plans to demonstrate the technology to the public on Thursday (Jan. 25) in Tokyo.

With the aim of spreading its technology to other areas of the world, the group also intends to bring its approach before such standards-making bodies as the International Telecommunication Union and the Open Mobile Alliance.

Now that the six research members have developed the basic platform, they intend to use the demonstration to broaden discussions of operational details and privacy protection.