Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC

Visa International Service Association

Lester L Waters

Matthew W Thomlinson

Jeffrey F Spelman

Robert B Seidensticker

Barbara Lynch Fox

Jonathan D Lazarus

David Van Gunter

A policy agent of a network performs an out-of-band user authentication process to verify the identity of a user of a client computer and associates the network data received from the client computer with the user. When the client computer initiates a network data connection to or through the policy agent, the policy agent sends an encrypted challenge to the client computer. The challenge is encrypted with a private key of the policy agent. When the client computer receives the challenge, it decrypts the challenge and prepares a message digest value based on the challenge and the network data sent by the user. The message digest value is then encrypted with the private key of the user to form a response, and the response is sent to the policy agent. The policy agent decrypts the response with the public key of the user to obtain the message digest value and calculates a digest value based on the challenge and the received network data. The policy agent then compares the calculated digest value with the decrypted digest value. A match between the two digest values indicates that the user is successfully authenticated and that the received network data are associated with the user. The policy agent may then apply network policies based on the credentials of the authenticated user.

System and method of user authentication for network communication through a policy agent

An electronic commerce system facilitates secure electronic commerce transactions among multiple participants. Each electronic commerce transaction involves at least one commerce document defining the transaction and at least one commerce instrument defining a payment for the transaction. The electronic commerce system has a credential binding server at a trusted credential authority, multiple computing units at associated participants, and a communication system interconnecting the credential binding server and the multiple computing units. The electronic commerce system operates in two phases: a registration phase and a transaction phase. During the registration phase, each of the computing units generate and send a registration packet over the communication system to the credential binding server. Unique credentials are produced by the credential binding server based upon the registration packets sent back to the computing units. During the transaction phase, an originating computing unit initially requests, receives, and verifies the credentials of expected recipient computing units to ensure communication between authenticate participants. Thereafter, the originating computing unit signs and encrypts the commerce document(s) and the commerce instrument(s) in a manner which ensures that only the intended recipients can decrypt them. The originating computing unit then sends both the commerce document(s) and instrument(s) over the communication system to a first recipient computing unit. The first recipient computing unit decrypts and verifies the commerce document (s) and/or instruments intended for it. The first recipient computing unit then passes the balance of the encrypted commerce document(s) and/or instrument(s) over the communication system to a second recipient computing unit, which decrypts and verifies the commerce document(s) and/or instrument(s) intended for it. This process is continued until all commerce documents and commerce instruments are distributed, decrypted, and verified by their intended recipients.

System and method for secure electronic commerce transaction

An electronic commerce system facilitates secure electronic commerce transactions among multiple participants. Each electronic commerce transaction involves at least one commerce document defining the transaction and at least one commerce instrument defining a payment for the transaction. The electronic commerce system has a credential binding server at a trusted credential authority, multiple computing units at associated participants, and a communication system interconnecting the credential binding server and the multiple computing units. The electronic commerce system operates in two phases: a registration phase and a transaction phase. During the registration phase, each of the computing units generate and send a registration packet over the communication system to the credential binding server. Unique credentials are produced by the credential binding server based upon the registration packets sent back to the computing units. During the transaction phase, an originating computing unit initially requests, receives, and verifies the credentials of expected recipient computing units to ensure communication between authenticate participants. Thereafter, the originating computing unit signs and encrypts the commerce document(s) and the commerce instrument(s) in a manner which ensures that only the intended recipients can decrypt them. The originating computing unit then sends both the commerce document(s) and instrument(s) over the communication system to a first recipient computing unit. The first recipient computing unit decrypts and verifies the commerce document(s) and/or instruments intended for it. The first recipient computing unit then passes the balance of the encrypted commerce document(s) and/or instrument(s) over the communication system to a second recipient computing unit, which decrypts and verifies the commerce document(s) and/or instrument(s) intended for it. This process is continued until all commerce documents and commerce instruments are distributed, decrypted, and verified by their intended recipients.

System and method for secure electronic commerce transactions

Several approaches to serializing a disc may be used in the present invention. First, portions of a disc (such as sector(s) or track(s)) may be physically damaged to create a pattern of damage that somewhat uniquely identifies the disc. A number of different techniques may be used to damage the disc. For instance, laser devices may be used, sharp devices may be used or a master disc may be configured to create the damage. The physical damage may be used in conjunction with soft damage that is encoded in software on the disc. Alternatively, certain soft damage approaches may be used separately to serialize the disc.

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Bellevue, WA, United States of America

Lester L Waters