To say it has been a tumultuous year would be an understatement. But at Remme, the mission remains the same: we are fiercely committed to realizing a new security standard to address the challenges of Web 3.0. To that end, our product suite – comprising Remme Protocol, Auth, and Keyhub – remains the focus of our attention, and we continue to refine them to better tackle issues related to security, authentication and digital certificate management.
In our latest quarterly update, we’ll take a closer look at developments in Auth, the benefits of running a blockchain pilot program and plenty more besides. Read on.
Auth: simple account security for everyone
Auth is a digital ID and data protection solution for web users who share our view that “Login with Facebook” is a risk worth avoiding. In recent months, we have launched a dedicated new website for Auth and also designed an onboarding flow which provides an insight into how 2-click passwordless authentication works.
Auth removes the hassle of logging into endless sites by letting you use one verified digital ID for multiple profiles. It also includes flexible recovery options with biometric hardware-based security.
Businesses can utilize Auth to facilitate secure multi-factor authentication access for employees, customers and partners, wherever they are. In a recent blogpost about federated identity and its potential for securing digital business, we highlighted how Auth could bolster the security of FI by minimizing the attackable surface area and decentralizing to eliminate single points of failure.
In terms of Customer Identity and Access Management (CIAM), we turned our attention in June to comparing various off-the-shelf CIAM solutions used to control consumer access to business. As we pointed out, the centralized design of traditional CIAM solutions “means that any system breach can prove fatal. Should a data leak occur, your entire customer database is at risk, and so is your business reputation. They are also costly to maintain due to the number of moving parts and the complexity this entails.”
Step forward Auth, which delivers a unified identity and access management solution minus the drawbacks. Businesses can elect not to store personal information at all to avoid the burden of safeguarding customer data, while regular users can share profile data with any website they wish – but also revoke permission whenever they like.
Trust us, the benefits of running a blockchain pilot program like Auth are legion, helping companies drive greater efficiencies particularly where accountability and auditability are concerned.
PKI(d) Protocol: codebase merge & updated developers portal
Back in January, the REMChain mainnet went live, the culmination of a long journey characterized by plenty of ups and downs. As you would expect, we’ve continued tweaking our next-gen PKI layer for creating and managing decentralized IDs and their digital keys, and at this stage the mainnet has 41 Block Producers, 84 Guardians, 35 million blocks produced and 283M REM staked. It’s not too late to jump onboard and become a REMChain participant.
Speaking of which, we’ve recently updated our Developers Portal to include in-depth Smart Contract development guides and examples intended to help developers build on REMChain. The protocol repository is helpfully split into two, and like the EOSIO repository structure, the main repository contains the sources of remnode while the new contracts repository details the sources of system smart contracts that operate the network. Incidentally, the protocol codebase was recently merged and synced with EOSIO 2.0.6 release.
Keyhub: automated SSL/TLS certificate management across enterprise
It’s been a year since we launched Keyhub 1.0, a cloud-based certificate lifecycle management tool, and it’s safe to say we haven’t rested on our laurels since then. We continuously improve and add new features to make our tool handier for all those responsible for PKI health. Check out our updated pages on Discovery, Inventory, Analytics, and SSL tools to get a grasp of what we offer.
In recent months, we have built on the successful partnership we secured at the turn of the year, when Certificate Authority GlobalSign started leveraging the tool. If GlobalSign’s feedback is anything to go by, our conviction that Keyhub is the decent certificate discovery tool on the market isn’t going to change any time soon.
In recent months, we’ve written a lot about the SSL/TLS certificate landscape, and about the improvements Keyhub can bring about. Back in April, we waxed lyrical about why SSL/TLS discovery software is essential to aggregate enterprises’ certificates, comparing a selection of free and paid tools. (Incidentally, there’s a decoding tool that can be accessed for free with Keyhub.)
We also investigated why there had been a sudden surge in expired SSL certificates in May, resulting in downtime for the likes of crypto exchange Coinbase. The spike in expired SSL certificates underlined, once more, the need to automate certificate lifecycle management.
The abandonment of Transport Layer Security (TLS) versions 1.0 and 1.1 by the likes of Google, Apple and Microsoft motivated us to consider other developments in the industry. To be sure, 2020 has been the most eventful year for CAs in recent memory with major web security measures introduced by the big tech multinationals. It’s worth casting your eyes back over the article to ensure you’re up to speed.
More recently, we wondered why so many enterprises viewed PKI management as a reactive rather than proactive process, attending to their certs only when problems arise. Surely, we reasoned, it would be smarter to monitor PKI before problems had the chance to derail projects? In any case, from our brainstorming bloomed this blog detailing 6 key indicators to track PKI health.
Looking ahead
And, breath! Yep, it’s been an extremely busy quarter – but we wouldn’t have it any other way. Looking ahead to the rest of 2020 and much of our focus will be dedicated to developing the Auth app (kind reminder on adding yourself to the beta waitlist); at the moment we’re working on the session management and activity dashboard, with profile management next on the agenda. When it’s perfected, it’ll help turn your phone into a veritable digital password. We’re talking unlimited profiles and full control from your dashboard. It’s a game-changer.
.png)
