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January 1, 2001

Consortium Aims To Unite XML Security Standards

Oasis Group Plans to combine specifications from two rival vendors

More on security:

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meeting set for next week could be a major step toward developing a single XML security standard that would give companies greater security authentication and authorization options when sharing data among customers, partners, and vendors.

Oasis, a standards and interoperability consortium that's trying to blend two competing XML security standards into one, will host the meeting. The rival XML security specifications are backed by two security vendors: Securant Technologies Inc., which has AuthXML, and Netegrity Inc., with S2ML.

Most analysts say the similarities between the proposed standards outweigh any differences. "Until now, this has been a Securant vs. Netegrity issue. Now it looks like we have the cooperation of both sides," says Pete Lindstrom, senior analyst, security strategies, at the Hurwitz Group. "Hopefully, they'll both work within Oasis to develop something useful."

To make that happen, Oasis formed the Security Technical Committee, which will meet Jan. 9. "These companies are in a very competitive posture, and we help to neutralize that," says Oasis executive director Laura Walker. "Both are receptive to working together on this."

Participating vendors include Baltimore Technologies, Entegrity Solutions, Entrust Technologies, Hewlett-Packard, iPlanet, Netegrity, Oblix, OpenNetwork Technologies, Securant Technologies, Tivoli Systems, and TransIndigo.

Cooperation is critical, says Gordon Eubanks, Oblix's president and CEO. Companies with different infrastructures need to be able to communicate that a user is authorized to perform transactions on other companies' sites. "It's important that the customer who purchases a product from one company is assured that they can easily work with their partners who chose a competing product," he says.

Even if Oasis is successful, however, analysts say it may be a year before products based on the stan-dard are available.