Re: [ebxmlms-develop] Using alternative signing key algorithms

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For this, we had a debate internally before. We concluded that the
nature of message signing and acknowledgement signing are different.
Message signing is used to testify the message (and the most important,
the payloads) is sent by the real sender. Acknowledgement signing is
used to testify the message has been safely arrived at the real
destination (i.e. the real MSH). Following this model, we can accept
all applications to "share" the private key for signing acknowledgement
messages. While at the same time, we think the non-repudiation property
of message signing drives us to think carefully about holding all keys
in a central point. Basically our concept is following the ASP model.
As a result, as you can see in the current design, we perform the
signing in Request object, i.e. in the client side. 
 
Regards, -Patrick 
 
 
Mayne, Peter wrote: 
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 &gt;&gt; I agree that there should also be a way of
having the MSH sign the outgoing message, so there wouldn't 
 &gt;&gt; need to be more than one copy of the private
key lying around. 
 &gt; 
 &gt; Yes and no. It may be more handy. But I'm just
feeling a bit unsecured to have MSH to hold the private 
 &gt; key for the application. What do you think? 
 But Hermes already has the private key for message
signing (MSH/DigitalSignature/AckSign/KeyStore) so it can sign
acknowledgements. I don't see any way around that.
 Given that the MSH must have a copy of the private
key (like it or not), it makes sense under some circumstances to have
that be the only copy of the private key.
 As usual, there's more than one configuration to
think about. 
 1) One single key at the MSH to do all outgoing
message signing (including originals and acknowledgements). This makes
sense for a single business sending messages to trading partners.
 2) All messages signed by the message clients. This
makes sense for Gait's suggestion of running the MSH in ASP mode for
different clients. The trouble with this is that message
acknowledgements are still signed by the MSH, rather than a client's
key, so running Hermes in ASP mode won't currently work.
 PJDM 
 -- 
 Peter Mayne 
 Technology Consultant 
 Spherion Technology Solutions 
 Level 1, 243 Northbourne Avenue, Lyneham, ACT, 2602 
 T: 61 2 62689727&nbsp; F: 61 2 62689777 
 
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