HISTORY AND ROLE OF INFORMATION SECURITY IN POSTAGE EVIDENCING AND PAYMENT (2005)

ABSTRACTStep-by-step, information security technology has enabled the transition of postage evidencing and payment security from reliance on people, manual processes and paper records to reliance on automated procedures, trusted remote data systems and cryptographic protocols. This evolution improved both the security and the convenience of postage evidencing and payment through postage metering and thus enabled effective access to postal products. Reset, the process of adding postage to the meter, changed from a visit to a post office and manual record keeping to communication with a data center to receive an authentication code with a subsequent automatic completion of the transaction. Verification of the authenticity of printed indicia changed from a forensic analysis to automatic cryptographic authentication. Finally, with the introduction of NIST standard FIPS 140–1 level 4 physical security requirements, manual inspection of meters that are compliant with this standard by postal officials is being replaced by online verification of their physical integrity and procedural accuracy. These improvements in their totality enabled a remarkable transition of one of the most traditional office devices from the analog to the digital age.KEYWORDS: Postage meteringUSPSe-commerceDESelliptic curveRSAFIPS 140 Additional informationNotes on contributorsRobert Corderythe Secure Systems Group in Advanced Concepts and Technology at Pitney Bowes. He has played a key role in the evolution of cryptographically secured postage evidencing. Robert's research interests include applications of cryptography, formal methods analysis of cryptographic protocols, authentication of printed images, watermarking printed documents and modeling ink-paper interactions. He holds a PhD in theoretical statistical physics from the University of Toronto.Leon PintsovInternational Standards Advanced Technology, is an internationally recognized authority in the field of payment security and information security. He is also recognized as an expert in the field of computer imaging and optical Character Recognition. He authored and co-authored a book on computer modeling of imaging devices and publications in the fields of computer imaging, cryptographic applications and transaction cost economics.In 1985 Leon was elected to the rank of a Senior Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. Leon is a member of American National Standards Institute accredited committee X9.F1 on financial Security and European Standardisation Committee (CEN) TC331 committee on postal standards where he chairs several sub-committees. He is also a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the Center for Applied Cryptographic Research at the University of Waterloo (Canada), a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of ONETS Corp (China), member of the Board of Directors of Connecticut Technology Council and MIT Forum of Connecticut (USA) and Advisory Board of Axiom Venture Partners in Hartford, Connecticut (USA).University of St. Petersburg (Russia), Executive MS degree in Management Science from the Hartford Graduate Center of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and PhD degree in Applied Mathematics from the Institute of Telecommunication Engineering in St. Petersburg.