Governance of computer-based interactions derives from policy specification mechanisms that are grounded in trust authorities and mechanisms that can be projected across the network. The detailed architecture of individual computers and the details of their network interconnections is a function of system administration. The administrators, entities whose role is one of enacting administration functions, derive their authority of control from their identities as established within the trust infrastructure of the network.

The software through which computer based social groupings are effected is generally divided into three component domains: application software, operating system software and middleware. The concepts of application software are based in the language of the problems being addressed at any particular time. Operating system software, on the other hand, is concerned with the sensori-motor environment of the specific computer system in question. Middleware generally comprises some, or all, of the protocols that connect these two domains together.

In the computer world, there is a given with regards to any level of security: a trust infrastructure must be based on a secure computer platform. To draw a parallel to the human mind, a secure platform is one on which it is not possible to establish an altered state of consciousness. This is simply a way of saying that no outside source can be allowed to impinge on the sensori-motor environment of the secure computer. There can be no eavesdroppers to detect and perhaps modify sensitive or secret information, and there can be no substitution or modification of the stored program that controls the sensori-motor environment of the computer. At the present time, the only way to effect any level of security within an unsecured, or dubious platform, is to add yet another platform that is secure and hence trusted.

Given a trusted platform, it is possible to establish a trusted communication channel with another trusted platform across connections that are not, themselves, intrinsically trusted. This can be accomplished through the use or cryptographic processes on the trusted platforms. In the same way, two generals communicate during the battle by sending each other secret messages that cannot be understood by the enemy even if they are intercepted. This allows for creation of a single trust environment within physically disjoint systems where the space separating them is suspect. Thus, it is possible to separate the client element of an application from the server element of an application and still enable them to share a common trust environment, as long as each resides on a trusted platform.

From a trusted platform, it is also possible to measure selected characteristics of another platform in order to imbue some level of trust in that platform. Further, it is possible, again from a trusted platform, to detect changes of certain types and levels in another platform in order to evaluate whether an ostensibly trusted platform has been compromised or not.

Trusted platforms derive their trust from their intrinsic characteristics that make them difficult or impossible to manipulate or modify. The degree to which they are impervious to such manipulation is termed their level of being tamper-resistant. Today, essentially no computer platforms are inherently tamper-proof; there are mechanisms to subvert virtually all known architectures, albeit at various costs. So, given that no platform is immune from manipulation, a necessary feature of trusted platforms is that of being tamper-evident. That is, if a platform is manipulated, then it should exhibit one or more telltale signs that it has been manipulated.

Finally, another given relative to computer systems is that complexity in computer software presents an enhanced threat environment. The problem is that, today, computer programming is still a cognitive process of the human mind. At the highest levels, it requires attention and action

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