NIST developed the Minimum Interoperability Specifications for PKI Components (MISPC), Version 1 with the assistance of ten CRADA partners: AT&T, BBN, Certicom, Cylink, DynCorp, IRE, Motorola, Nortel (Entrust), Spyrus, and Verisign. The specification includes a certificate and CRL profile, message formats and basic transactions for a PKI issuing signature certificates. The specification includes support for multiple signature algorithms and transactions to support a broad range of security policies. This document has been formally published as a NIST Special Publication 800-15; it is available electronically in Microsoft Word (284K) or PostScript (954K).  

NIST has developed an updated specification with the help of CRADA partners to enhance the specification to support development of conforming PKI components. MISPC Version 2 is available for review and comment. The associated reference implementation is currently undergoing an upgrade and will be available second quarter of fiscal year 2001.