Patent ID: 7194759

Claim:
A method, comprised of enhancing a computational service to each client of a plurality of clients, by: moving a selected portion of a computation from a server into a trusted co-server executing inside a secure coprocessor; allowing each client to interact with the server and the co-server; and using the trusted co-server as a trusted third party to authenticate interactions between the client and the server; and wherein the moving step includes the steps of i) installing a device private/public key pair on the co-server, ii) installing co-server application software in the trusted co-server, said co-server application software having an ability to authenticate itself using said device key pair, iii) the co-server application software then generating an application key pair including a public key and a private key, iv) using the co-server application's ability to authenticate itself with said device key pair to prove to a certificate authority that said application key pair belongs to an installation of said co-server application, v) the certificate authority then issuing a certificate attesting to the public key of said application key pair and the entity to which said public key belongs, and vi) the co-server application storing said certificate, the step of using the trusted co-server includes the steps of i) establishing a session between the client and the co-server application, and ii) indicating to the client that the co-server application demonstrates knowledge of the private key of said application key pair to provide assurance of the authenticity of communication from the trusted co-server.