Today, a seal is used to protect files sent by customers to BGC from tampering. Seals are used in the “other” means of communication, in other words FTP over the Internet, Netview FTP, Connect:Direct and TCP/IP FTP. (BgCom and Bankgiro Link are not affected).
BGC has earlier allowed two different algorithms for seal generation: the Message Authenticator Algorithm (MAA), which is an open standard with no license fee, and Nexus Sigillet (previously Säkdata). MAA (ISO 8731-2) has been revoked and will be replaced by a new seal-generation algorithm: HMAC-SHA-256 (Hash-based Method Authentication Code – Secure Hash Algorithm – 256-bit) with a 128-bit key. HMAC-SHA-256 is also an open standard and functions in a manner similar to MAA, but it uses a longer seal key.
HMAC is operational as of 1 April 2008.
MAA will cease to function on 31 March 2009.
Nexus Sigillet will continue to work as before.
All customers who currently use MAA need to change methods. The software companies that support MAA sealing need to rewrite their software to support HMAC instead.