Benefits include the ability to securely provide services to customers without compromising the VCCS network infrastructure and related resources. For the greatest level of security, these features need to be available at the application level, rather than the network level. Message Privacy ensures messages sent are not visible to network eavesdroppers. Messages are encrypted prior to transmission, then decrypted at the receiving end. Authentication is the process used to verify identity.
Authentication is composed of three basic schemes.
Simple Authentication-checking that customers are who they say they are by providing a password before granting them access. Host Authentication-gives customers the capability to verify that they're communicating with a valid host. Message Authentication-permits documents to be digitally signed, allowing them to be traced back to the sender and preventing them from being changed in transit. The VCCS will utilize simple authentication as its primary layer of security for accessing applications. After authentication, customers have transparent, yet secured, access to any application to which they have authorized access.