EDIFACT security made simple - the EDIMED approach

EDIMED is a general message interchange tool, primarily aimed at exchange of health care information by means of EDIFACT messages over X.100 electronic mail. To allow transfer of very sensitive health care data in accordance with the rules of the Norwegian authorities, a strong security system is needed. This article shows how security of EDIFACT messages can be implemented in a simple and efficient way. EDIMED uses DES encryption with a system for manual key distribution to provide integrity, confidentiality, peer-entity authentication and non-repudiation services to its applications.