RE: How to securely connect to IIS outside the firewall.

["Walden H. Leverich" <WaldenL@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>From: Nathan M. Andelin [mailto:nandelin@relational-data.com]
>This approach is a lot less complex then VPN, but equally secure.

VPNs can be very simple to install so I question the "lot less complex"
part. But more importantly, unless I'm forgetting something, SSL promises
two things:

1) The server I'm talking to is the server I think it is.
2) The communication between the server and client is encrypted.

Given that IIS in this case would be the client and the AS/400 the server I
don't see how this helps. The AS/400 would need a certificate from a trusted
party (for argument sake, verisign) or it could self sign. In either case
that would enable IIS to know that the AS/400 it's speaking to is indeed the
AS/400 it should be speaking to.

However, in this case doesn't Dave need the AS/400 to know that this IIS box
is indeed the IIS box it thinks it is. In other words you need to use
certificates to validate CLIENT identity, not server identity. Now,
certificates are capable of doing that, but that is not "normal" SSL and now
you are into things that are much more complex than VPNs.

-Walden

------------
Walden H Leverich III
President
Tech Software
(516)627-3800 x11
WaldenL@TechSoftInc.com
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