Industrial Bank of Japan (IBJ), a subsidiary of Mizuho Holdings, and Standard Chartered are the latest banks to begin using the Identrus global trust network to conduct secure business exchanges with corporate customers over the Internet. Both began issuing digital certificates in recent weeks after passing rigorous technical, regulatory and business process audits to join the network of deployed Identrus financial institutions worldwide, which now number eleven.
Now that it can enable them with high-level security, Standard Chartered is moving many of its services onto the internet, including payment initiation, collections, foreign exchange and custody services.
Over the next few months, Standard Chartered will be conducting pilots with several prominent corporate customers and will enter full production in mid-2002 in more than a dozen countries, including Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, India, and the Persian Gulf countries, Africa, the United States and the United Kingdom. The bank is also considering using Identrus to secure a variety of technologies, including computer-to-computer transactions, secure e-mail, mobile communications and handheld personal digital assistants (PDAs).
By the end of 2002, Standard Chartered plans to implement its Identrus compliant services in as many as 30 countries with the goal of ultimately expanding its offering to all of the bank's 50-plus markets.
"Corporate customers increasingly realize that through Identrus they can trust a transaction in the cyber world as they do in the world of paper, ink signatures and face-to-face contact," says Guy Tallent, Identrus President and CEO. "Financial institutions are increasingly intent on providing e-trust, and Identrus is the solution that demonstrates that commitment."
IBJ began live production in the Identrus system on February 12 and has begun to issue Global IDs to its commercial customers. The bank is currently testing a document management application that will enable customers to securely exchange high value, highly sensitive collaborative information and execute non-repudiable document delivery with complete confidence. IBJ also is one of the founding banks of the Eleanor global payments initiation project, and is developing an Eleanor pilot program for 2002 in addition to other Identrus initiatives.
The bank plans to use Identrus as a fundamental part of its business-to-business infrastructure and is also currently discussing plans for interoperating with other Japanese member banks, which it hopes will eventually lead to expanded new business opportunities. "Identrus gives IBJ customers a secure, cost-effective way to engage in e-commerce with trading partners, and gives us a solid foundation to further develop our portfolios of e-business services," says Souya Nakazato, IBJ's deputy general Manager.
