The World e-Trust Initiative launched 2002 | International Telecommunication Union (ITU)

The World e-Trust Initiative was launched in 2002 by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) to establish a highly secure online infrastructure for developing countries.

World e-Trust quickly attracted the attention of people from the developed world as well. It turns out that the authenticity and security challenges faced by individuals in their homes, users of corporate networks, and business people in developing nations all have remarkable similarities.

The World e-Trust was ahead of its time, coming into being in an era when experts still clung to a belief that problems of security, if not authenticity, would gradually be reduced by steady improvements in the technology of examining packet streams to determine the intentions of their originators. Since then it has become clear that the world needs something better.

World e-Trust, with more recent enhancements, is that something better. Take a close look at this remarkable combination of centuries-old certification processes, proven public key infrastructure, and methods borrowed from the world of physical architecture and construction. Ask yourself whether this can be the definitive means to bring authenticity to the online world; and whether authenticity is not the solution to problems of spam, malware, fraud, predation, botnets. Isn't authenticity the solution to problems of inauthenticity?

The World e-Trust Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was made available for signing by the traditional constituency of the ITU, which consists of telecommunications ministries of member nations and sector member organizations.