ContentAssurity is easy to use software that helps you digitally sign and protect content (text) for use with any application (e-mail, IM, document, spreadsheet, etc.).
You can sign and protect a message to go securely with any e-mail or IM package, the entire contents of a document, or just paragraphs, cells in a spreadsheet or whatever you choose to select. Content may be stored in application you wish or kept in the ContentAssurity message store.
Any number of people can sign or countersign content, and it can be protected for individuals or for groups of recipients. Protected content can always be read by the user that protected it.
A comprehensive audit trail of signed and protected content showing who signed it, when and in which order, and who it was protected for is always available.
These features are now described in more detail.
Digitally signing content
You sign content to prove that it came from you and that it has not been altered since you signed it. This is more powerful than a handwritten signature which can be altered. More than one person can digitally sign content, simply by selecting it in ContentAssurity and clicking on the Secure button with their own signature selected.
When you receive content that has been signed in ContentAssurity it checks the signature immediately to make sure nothing has been altered, and then checks to see if you already know the signatory (either because you already have their key or because they have used a key from a recognized public Certification Authority). If either check fails you are warned. ContentAssurity uses the RSA 2048 bit key with the SHA-1 algorithm for digital signatures.
ContentAssurity uses the text format for content to provide enhanced protection for users. Consistent with the technical standards supporting the European Digital Signature Directive, ‘What you see is what you Sign.’ It is not possible to have hidden text (as could happen with other formats such as HTML or XML) or to automatically include information from somewhere else without your knowledge.
Protecting content
You protect content to make sure that only the intended recipient(s) can read it. That way it doesn’t matter who gets hold of protected content, because they can’t read or use it. So your content is safe and can’t be seen by anyone else, even the most skilled of hackers.
If you protect content for someone else ContentAssurity will automatically protect it for you as well, ensuring that you always have access to your protected content. Once content has been protected, ContentAssurity automatically protects any later edits to that content for all the previous recipients without your needing to do anything. If you just add your signature to protected information it does not remove the protection. If you protect content for a new recipient at any stage they are added to the list of recipients.
Content is protected by encryption. This scrambles the content making it impossible to read unless you have secret information that tells you how to unscramble it. This is far more secure than using passwords or self-decrypting executables to protect information. Hackers are able to break password based systems very quickly, whilst breaking encryption is nearly impossible. ContentAssurity uses the AES algorithm (recommended by NIST, the US government agency) at its strongest key length of 256 bits to give you the maximum protection available.
Message store, history and audit log
ContentAssurity keeps a log of all the messages that you process. In that log it keeps the history of the content each time it has been altered. Whenever content is signed and/or protected ContentAssurity securely adds that information so that you have a reliable audit trail showing what the content was at any point in time, who had signed it and who it had been protected for.
You can see whenever content has been altered, all the way back to the origination of that particular content, and check who was involved at each stage.
When you are navigating through message history you are shown the audit information relevant to the level that you have selected. You can copy information shown in the audit panel to the clipboard and then into any word processing application if you need a hard copy of it.
Application independence
ContentAssurity has been designed to be independent of specific computer applications. This is for two reasons.
The first is so that it can be used in any environment regardless of the applications being used by originator or recipient.
The second is to prevent ContentAssurity from being compromised by the application it has been integrated into. Unfortunately, it is a fact of life that where applications are integrated a security failure in one (Outlook Express, for instance) can create a security failure in the other. Also, where application plug-ins are used to achieve integration they can conflict with each other, causing application crashes and support problems.
ContentAssurity avoids all these problems whilst delivering advanced functionality and security.
E-mail and IM security
ContentAssurity can be used very easily to send secure e-mail and IM text content. It does not matter which e-mail or IM client you or your recipient(s) are using. Having signed and protected your content you only have to copy it into the e-mail or IM service for a totally secure transfer. It does not matter whether your provider has SSL, VPN or not. The signed and protected information you are sending cannot be seen or changed by anyone who is not a recipient.
Free reader software
Your recipients don’t need to buy ContentAssurity before you can communicate securely with them. If all they need to do is be able to receive content from you they can download a free reader from the ArticSoft web site www.articsoft.com or you can send them one if you prefer. All they have to do is generate their own identity key (or buy one from one of the public authorities if they prefer), and then send it on to you so that you can protect content for them. You add it to your keystore and you’re ready to go.
Simplicity of operation
If you have some content that needs to be digitally signed or you want to keep it confidential, copy it into ContentAssurity, select the signing and protection keys and click on the Secure button. The content is now in your clipboard ready to go into whatever application you want.
If you receive protected content you will know because it will tell you at the beginning that it is ContentAssurity protected. Select all and copy to put it in the clipboard. Then in ContentAssurity click on the unprotect/verify button.
ContentAssurity automatically checks all the signatures on the content and warns you of any failures. If it finds keys that you do not already have in your keystore you will be given the option to add them. You can see the content in the main window and the verification and history in the windows below.
If you want to sign content you have received (to agree to it or authorize it) just check that you have the right signing key selected. If you also use a protection key it will be added to the protection list. Click on sign/protect and the updated content is ready in the clipboard for whatever application you want to paste it into.
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