Network Interoperability Program

The increased use of the evolving commercial infrastructure places special constraints on the development of security products. The Interoperability Program is an umbrella effort to develop interoperability requirements for the family of encryption products providing the security of the network infrastructure. The initial output of this effort is the Interoperability Functional Requirements Criteria. The document was created to provide guidelines and requirements on classes of security products which will operate over the evolving commercial infrastructure. It was developed by a working group including representatives from DOD and commercial companies. Encryption classes were defined at the link, network and application layers. Based upon the expected evolution of the commercial architecture approaches were developed to both provide heterogeneity of equipment and extend transparency of needed security services across all layers. Important areas of inclusion in the specification are: (1) the establishment of the Internet Security Association and Key Management Protocol (ISAKMP) as the security management protocol, (2) definition of a transition from the Security Association Management Protocol (ISAMP) to ISAKMP, and (3) the establishment of an interpretable Domain of Interpretation (DOI). Along with this, common encryption data handling and voice algorithms were defined to insure a least common denominator mode with heterogeneity between equipment