Project History

Several years ago, ITSC has already implemented a preliminary PKI model in HKUST as a pilot run. The followings are some major highlights of the project.

Jun 1995 HKUST becomes the X.500 NameFlow Paradise Hong Kong Country Manager
Jan 1996 LDAP Directory Service project started
Jul 1996 "HKUST Communications Directory (Phone Book System)" implemented on LDAP Directory Server
Feb 1997 Preliminary Study of PKI project began
Nov 1997 Campus-wide PKI Model Ready for Pilot Run
  • Certificate Authority (CA) system was designed and implemented in the campus.
  • Digital Certificates, both client and server certificates, were being issued for HKUST users as a pilot run. Applications like signed emails, encrypted emails, server to server secure transactions, etc are all supported.
  • LDAP Directory Server was setup as a centralized repository to hold users' information including digital certificates. Information about our complete LDAP implementation can be found at the web site LDAP Directory Service.
  • Details about our 1st phase implementation can be found at our web site, What is Digital Certificate?
May 1998 Study on potential use of Smart Card technology in PKI started
Jul 1998 2nd phase LDAP Directory Service design finalized. Position as one of the basic campus-wide computing infrastructure for various applications
Nov 1998 Rollout 2nd phase LDAP Directory Service and becomes crucial service for
  • Central user database System
  • Campus Authentication System
Jan 1999 Started evaluation of Smart card as secure key storage
Mar 1999 Windows 2000 PKI and Active Directory evaluation started
Sep 1999 2nd Phase PKI Model began
Mar 2000 Smart Card pilot run for CS and CPEG students
Jun 2000 Certificate issued to individuals as well as departmental servers
Jan 2003 New RSA Keon Certification Authority (CA) server and PKI system is ready to serve the whole HKUST community
Feb 2003 Personal (Smartcard) e-Cert available for campus smartcard (HKUST Card) holders
Nov 2003 Sending "Signed Email" Supported in HKUST WebMail
Nov 2003 Role e-Cert available for departmental accounts