Tokyo – September 1, 2009 – GMO Hosting & Security subsidiary and digital certificate services provider, GlobalSign K.K, today launches Public Root Certificate Service, a GlobalSign trusted root for organizations that with their own private certificate authorities.

GMO Hosting & Security is a GMO Internet Group company.

Up until now, organizations have constructed PKI*1 chiefly for internal purposes to authenticate specified users for access control and log in. Recently PKI is increasingly used as a digital signature, however certificates issued by private CAs as digital signatures for email and other electronic documents, are not automatically publicly trusted when used externally. If a private CA root certificate is not chained to a trusted root CA it can cause security warning messages to be displayed by operating systems and email clients when mail or other documents signed by the in house PKI are received.

The new Public Root Signature Service allows private CAs to inherit trust from GlobalSign by being certified through the GlobalSign root certificate. This makes it possible for an existing enterprise private CA to operate effectively like the company’s own public CA. GlobalSign’s public root certificate is issued from a root CA trusted by almost all mainstream browsers, operating systems, and mail software enabling digital signatures received to be authenticated without a prior key exchange or special configuration.

*1:

PKI is (Public Key Infrastructure) A security system that uses the public/private key pair from public key cryptosystem technology

Who Should Use the Public Root Signature Service?

The Public Root Signature service significantly expands the capabilities of our customers PKI while dramatically reducing the time and cost of system reconstruction.

• Customers with strong access authentication using in house CA client certificates who would like to be able to digitally sign and encrypt S/MIME messages.
• Customers who are currently using client certificates to certify internal access control and log in but need to distribute a trusted certificate for external communication.
• Customers looking to expand the scope of their PKI environment.

GlobalSign

GlobalSign began providing digital authentication services to Belgium ten years ago when digital authentication companies were first beginning to appear. Customers include a number of Belgian government agencies and the GlobalSign Certificate Authority operates many prestigious government projects such as eID*(BELPIC). We are recognized as the Belgian Government Certificate Authority. GlobalSign became a member of the GMO Internet Group in 2006 and is expanding sales of government-level security Japan and worldwide.

*eID:

A citizen ID card. This is the first stage of the e-government project in Belgium. The ID card containing a digital certificate is distributed to all Belgian citizens over the age of 12.

Performance: (cumulative figures)

• Over 100,000 SSL Server Certificates issued
• Over1.4 million digital certificates (for web sites, IC Cards etc. including Digital IDs) issued
• Over 20 million certificates worldwide rely on the public trust provided by the GlobalSign root (including issues by subordinate CAs)
• We supply many government agencies, the Belgian government and major corporations.

Profile

• The first certificate authority in Europe to obtain WebTrust accreditation
• CABF (CA/Browser Forum) member
  In Japan GlobalSign (formerly GeoTrust JAPAN) participates as JCAF (Japan Certification Authority Forum)
• Anti-Phishing Working Group member

Media Inquiries

GMO Hosting and Security Inc. Corporate Planning Department
E-mail: pr@gmo-hs.com

GMO Internet
E-mail: pr@gmo.jp

About GMO Internet Group

GMO Internet Group, headquartered in Japan, is a leading force in the Internet industry offering one of the most comprehensive ranges of Internet services worldwide. The group holds top domestic market share in domain registration, web hosting, and payment processing and provides a host of other Internet services including global online security services, e-commerce solutions, and Internet advertising to both businesses and individuals. At the centre of the group is GMO Internet, Inc. a company listed on the prestigious first section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange (TSE: 9449).

GlobalSign K.K.

GMO Hosting & Security, Inc.

GMO Internet Inc.