Cylink Offers Royalty-Free Implementation of Digital Signature Standard to the Internet Software Consortium

Business Wire, Jan 14, 1998

SUNNYVALE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 14, 1998--

For the First time, Developers have Unlimited use of Royalty-Free

Security Methods for Building Applications

Cylink Corp. (Nasdaq:CYLK), a leading worldwide supplier of network security solutions, today announces that it has joined forces with the Internet Software Consortium (ISC) to move information security away from closely held, proprietary algorithms into the age of widely available security solutions.

Cylink is offering the ISC and its members a proven implementation of Digital Signature Standard for securing DNS (Directory Name Service). DNS is the one of the foundational technologies of the Internet, and without secure DNS Internet communications is vulnerable. Applying DSS to DNS will allow users of various applications to use the Internet with a great deal more confidence.

"The Internet Software Consortium is committed to seeing security deployed throughout the Internet infrastructure," said Carl Malamud, Chairman of the ISC. "We applaud Cylink's efforts to make sure that programmers have the choice of robust toolkits and different algorithms as they implement security."

"The widespread use of information security has been stymied by the lack of freely-available, proven, public-key cryptography," said Fernand Sarrat, President and CEO of Cylink Corp. "Cylink and ISC are moving network security to the new age where security is not technology but an integrated component of network solutions."

The agreement allows the implementation of the DNS Security standards in BIND, a publicly available implementation of the Domain Name System. Much of the DNS implementations on the Internet are derived from BIND. Cylink will offer the same license to other DNS developers for an unlimited time period, royalty-free, so that non-BIND-based DNS products can also be secured. Since every device on the Internet currently implements the existing insecure DNS, the Cylink implementation can be embedded in a wide variety of products, including routers and firewalls, and that eventually Secure DNS will appear in every device on the Internet.

Secure DNS is an element of the public key cryptography standards initiatives of the IETF, which include CMP, S/MIME, OpenPGP, ISAKMP, SKIP, and TLS. The ISC and Cylink are also looking at other opportunities to apply Cylink's security technology to other aspects of the Internet.

About the ISC

The ISC is a nonprofit corporation dedicated to production-quality software engineering for key Internet standards. The Internet Software Consortium is a volunteer effort founded by BIND developer Paul Vixie to ensure publicly available implementations of software that is crucial to the operation of the Internet Infrastructure. Programs released in 1996 include implementations of the Domain Name System (BIND), Netnews (INN) and the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) The Internet Software Consortium is funded by contributions from industry and individuals, including major support in 1997 from Usenix and Network Solutions, Inc.

About Cylink

Cylink Corporation, and its wholly owned subsidiary, Algorithmic Research, are leading providers of encryption-based network security solutions and wireless communications. Their products enable the secure transmission of data over networks, including local-area networks (LANs), wide-area networks (WANs), and public packet-switched networks such as the Internet. Cylink and Algorithmic Research serve Fortune 500 companies, multinational financial institutions, and government agencies worldwide. For more information, visit our web sites at http://www.cylink.com . and http://www.arx.com

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Note: Except for the historical information contained herein, matters discussed in this release are forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties, and actual results could be materially different. Forward-looking statements include statements regarding the use of Cylink's software by the Internet Software Consortium (ISC) or its members. Factors that could cause actual results to differ include the possible introduction of new technologies and other risk factors listed from time to time in the company's SEC reports, including but not limited to the report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 1996, and its reports on Forms 10-Q and the Annual Report to shareholders.

CONTACT: Media Contacts:

Gene Carozza Jill Egel

Cylink Corp. Marenghi & Associates

(408) 328-5175 (617) 239-0057

carozza@cylink.com jegel@marenghi.com