LANKASIGN Certificate Authority launched

Ramani Kangaraarachchi

A critical and long awaited service in the area of information security for the financial sector is now fulfilled said Deputy Governor Central Bank Dr Ranee Jayamaha who was the Chief Guest at the launch of the LANKASIGN Certificate Authority in Sri Lanka held at the LankaClear Corporate Office in Colombo recently.

Executive Director / COO of Sampath Bank Aravinda Perera, accepting the first digital certificate from Deputy Governor of Central Bank Dr Ranee Jayamaha. Also in the picture are Chairman, LankaClear Sarath De Silva,(extreme right) and CEO, LankaClear Sunimal Weerasooriya (extreme left).

Congratulating LankaClear on this significant achievement through a fully homegrown system using local expertise she requested LankaClear to look at the possibility of extending the services beyond the Financial Sector of Sri Lanka and also to other countries in the Region.

It is for the first time LankaClear(Pvt) Ltd., the national clearing house, launched this Certificate Authority (CA) for the Financial Sector in Sri Lanka under the brand name LANKASIGN.

The Chairman of LankaClear, Sarath de Silva said that the launch of the LANKASIGN Certificate Authority signifies another milestone of the achievements of LankaClear in delivering services to the financial sector.

He acknowledged the contributions of the Central Bank of Sri Lanka, the ICT Agency of Sri Lanka, the TechCERT of University of Moratuwa, Banking Community and the Vendors for their support in making the Financial Sector Certificate Authority a reality and stated that this was a joint exercise of all parties.

Legal Advisor and Program Director Jayantha Fernando , ICTA said that the LankaClear (CA) will go down the annals of banking history as another landmark achievement. He further said that with the Common Payment Switch and the Direct Connectivity of the Cheque Imaging and Truncation System (CITS) becoming operational in the near future, the deployment of LANKASIGN becomes all the more significant.

He said, that the use of Digital Certificates issued by LankaClear by the banks would ensure greater authenticity, integrity and reliability to the transactions of the Common Payment Switch and the CITS and benefit from the provisions of the Electronic Transactions Act of 2006, especially the rules governing evidence.

He also mentioned that the launch of LANKASIGN makes it the first Certification Service Provider under the Electronic Transactions Act of 2006 and would set the framework for the establishment of the National level Certification Authority under the said Act.

CEO of LankaClear Sunimal Weerasooriya said that four different types of Digital Certificates would be issued to the Financial Institutes to cater to various needs of signing and encryption of financial messages, documents, e-mails etc of banks. In the first phase, certificates required for the signing and encryption of financial messages sent through the Common Payment Switch and CITS would be issued.

In the second phase certificates required to secure Internet Banking Transactions and other Web Based Applications would be issued. In the final phase certificates would be issued to individuals for secure internet banking access, e-mail communications etc.