Trusted Third Party (TTP)

What is a Trusted Third Party?

Parties on the Internet can use digital certificates in order to guarantee integrity and authenticity of shared messages. However: how can these parties be sure that the digital certificates being used, can be trusted? Therefore, they need a socalled Trusted Third Party (TTP): an independent, unbiased third party that vouches for the authenticity of the digital certificates being exchanged.  PinkRoccade Trusted Services is such a Trusted Third Party. As a TTP, PinkRoccade Trusted Services capitalizes on three strengths to assure that its Digital IDs can be trusted: practices, technology and facilities:

  • Practices. PinkRoccade Trusted Services has outlined its practices for controlling the issuance, verification, and revocation of digital certificates in its Certification Practice Statement (CPS). This document establishes the legal infrastructure and operating metrics for PinkRoccade Trusted Services’ position as a trusted third party on the Internet by covering important issues such as verification requirements for certificate applications, issuing procedures, and revocation.
  • Technology. PinkRoccade Trusted Services’ digital certificates use today's strongest cryptographic techniques (Public Key Cryptography) to ensure that the digital certificates are not tampered with or forged.
  • Facilities. To ensure the integrity of the digital certificates it issues, PinkRoccade Trusted Services’ facility features state-of-the-art security systems, including multi level physical access controls, biometric scanners, infrared monitors, and the latest firewall technology. Additionally, the Operations Center of PinkRoccade Trusted Services has fault-tolerant computing and disaster-recovery capabilities. All certificate issuance and managment takes place within a 5-tier military grade secure data center, by employees who have undergone rigorous background checks.

 Tasks of  a TTP

  • Act as a Certification Authority. A Certification Authority (CA) is responsible for issuing and managing digital certificates.
  • Determine policies for a particular PKI.
  • Register and accepting applications for certificates from end users and other entities
  • Validating entities’ identities and their rights to receive certificates. The task of authenticating the user is assigned to the Registration Authority (RA).
  • Issuing certificates
  • Revoking, renewing, and performing other lifecycle services on certificates
  • Publishing directories of valid certificates
  • Publishing lists of revoked certificates (Certificate Revokation List (CRL))
  • Maintaining the strictest possible security for the CA’s signing key (the encryption key, used by the CA to digitally sign the certicates of its users)
  • Ensure that the CA’s own certificate is widely distributed, so that trust among the members of the infrastructure is established
  • Providing risk management.

Role of PinkRoccade Trusted Services as a TTP

PinkRoccade Trusted Services, as a partner of VeriSign (the leading provider of certificates and certificate-based services), helps performing TTP tasks in two different ways:

  1. PinkRoccade Trusted Services itself serves as a Trusted Third Party for the Internet.In order to fulfill this role, PinkRoccade Trusted Services has invested heavily in its own infrastructure and practices. Our technology and practices are regularly audited by a professional accounting firm.
  2. PinkRoccade Trusted Services has a broad range of solutions to allow other organizations to establish themselves as Certificate Authorities for their Intranets and Extranets.Establishing your own Public Key Infrastructure would require heavy investments in a high quality set of technology, infrastructure and practices. PinkRoccade Trusted Services offers you an cost-effective alternative:
    • your organization maintains complete control over the front-end functions (determining who gets certificates, whose certificates get revorked etc.);
    • all of the back-end functions of generating certificates, managing security, maintaining systems, backing up data, auditing security etc. is handled by the secure facilities of PinkRoccade Trusted Services.