Chapter 18. Security

Jon Udell, BYTE.com, and Nimisha Asthagiri and Walter Tuvell, Groove Networks

Security is hard enough in traditional networks that depend on central servers. It's harder still in peer-to-peer networks, particularly when you want to authenticate your communication partners and exchange data only with people you trust. Earlier chapters stressed protection for users' anonymity. The need to assert identity is actually more common than the need to hide it, though the two are not mutually exclusive. As shown in Chapter 16, systems that assign pseudonyms to users need not absolve users of responsibility. This chapter touches on the interplay of identity and pseudonymity too, but will mainly focus on how to authenticate users and ensure they can communicate securely in a peer-to-peer system.