4BF announces award for PKI innovation
06 August, 2012
category: Digital ID, Government, Smart Cards
The 4 Bridges Forum (4BF) has announced an awards program for the recognition of innovative PKI solutions using high-assurance digital identities in both the public and private sectors.
PKI, or public key infrastructure, is a secure and efficient information technology supporting the rapidly expanding global Internet trust network. PKI is employed in a number of security initiatives and enables digital transactions at the intra-governmental, business-to-business and business-to-government levels.
PKI’s Web-based capabilities eliminate the need for paper-based practices- which tend to be slow and costly- and effectively deter identity fraud.
4BF’s award anticipates nominations from U.S. Federal agencies, where the use of PKI and PIV is widely incorporated. PKI is a crucial cog in the PIV credentials that all federal employees are equipped with and use to access Federal buildings and secure networks everyday.
The award will feature a two-tier structure. Award nominations will be gathered from four categories with a single, master award to be chosen from the category winners. The four categories are as follows:
- Innovation: concerned with new and effective uses of PKI
- Business value: concerned with the return on investment (quantitative and qualitative) of PKI
- Federation: concerned with new and effective uses of federation
- Collaboration: the use of PKI or PKI tools to facilitate collaboration or increased community cooperation
The deadline for nominations is September 14, and can be made on the 4BF website. A panel of judges representing each of the four PKI bridges will consider the nominations.
Award winners will be announced in early November, with presentation of the awards to be conducted at the 11th Annual Smart Card Alliance Government Conference in Washington, D.C. on November 27.
The participating members, or PKI bridges, of the 4BF include the Federal PKI Policy Authority, SAFE-BioPharma, CertiPath and the Research and Education Bridge Certification Authority (REBCA).
