HongKong Post & TrustAsia to leverage E-Certs
Hongkong Post has teamed with Singapore-based digital trust and payment services provider TrustAsia to develop electronic payment applications and services that leverage the post’s e-Cert digital certificates.
Targeting its e-payment services at different market segments, the partnership seeks to ride the upcoming project of embedding the post’s e-Certs onto the new Hong Kong Smart ID cards. The launch of the free one-year e-Cert option is part of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region’s Smart ID Card Replacement Exercise, scheduled to begin in August.
Launched in 2001, Hongkong Post’s e-Certs find application in several areas including e-government services and commercial electronic transactions in the field of banking, finance, telecommunications, healthcare, entertainment and education.
The e-Certs assure a transaction’s authentication, integrity, non-repudiation and confidentiality. They can also be used to generate a digital signature that enjoys the same legal status as a handwritten signature under the local Electronic Transactions Ordinance.
The post offers a variety of e-Certs for individuals and organizations as well as a mobile e-Cert.
“The collaboration with TrustAsia represents our commitment to driving the development of Hong Kong’s e-commerce,” said Hongkong Post postmaster general Allan Chiang. “As the first public Certification Authority in Hong Kong, we are well positioned to launch e-payments, the success of which is contingent on security and reliability.”
The current plan is to provide new payment services only in Hong Kong. They are scheduled to start in Q3.
The post reckons that the anticipated critical mass of holders of e-Cert embedded Smart ID Cards offers a unique opportunity to partner with TrustAsia to launch such secure e-payment services. Describing the alliance with Hongkong Post as a long-term alliance, TrustAsia CEO Lay Ann Ong said the “partnership allows us to use the infrastructure they are putting in place.”
Ong expects that by associating with the post TrustAsia will be able to build a household brand in Hong Kong. “Pretty much, we want to be seen as the technology partner for Hongkong Post on various new initiatives,” Ong said.
The two organizations plan to initially roll out four payment services: IPayU, We Accept, We Verify and Biz2Biz.
IPayU is a PKI-supported person-to-person Internet payment service that uses the e-Cert for authentication. IPayU will also let subscribers make payments via e-mail.
WeAccept enables e-tailers to accept credit card payments online. The service is also designed to support phone and mail order transactions sent online to a bank’s network and processor. WeVerify is a hosted service that supports Verified with Visa authentication. WeVerify uses the e-Certs embedded in the Hong Kong Smart ID card as an enrollment method for Verified by Visa.
Targeted at corporate customers, Biz2Biz is a connectivity platform that connects banks and their customers to electronic marketplaces and other financial institutions to enable secure delivery of payment instructions to any of the connected banks. Biz2Biz is expected to leverage the e-Certs for user authentication and lets users digitally sign a transaction for data integrity and protection.
Both Hongkong Post and TrustAsia plan to sell the services under a revenue-sharing arrangement. Users will be charged on a per-transaction basis for some services and for others on a monthly subscription basis but pricing details were not disclosed. In the next phase, Ong expects the two organizations will introduce additional payment services that will leverage mobile e-Certs and install web-enabled kiosks in the post office. Ong says the goal is to provide Hong Kong citizens with various payment services “regardless of the medium they’re going to approach us from.”
The deal with TrustAsia is part of the post’s aggressive strategy to drive use of its e-Certs by getting more application
