Partners Defend Pentium III Serial Number

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February 18, 1999 (10:08 AM EST)

Intel's business partners defended the chip maker's plans to embed a serial number in the new Pentium III processor, saying it's a valuable tool for corporate asset-tracking and authenticating users in business transactions.

Passwords can be compromised, and mechanisms such as cookies and digital certificates can be copied or accidentally erased from a hard disk. But the chip serial number is an indelible part of the chip, and -- when used in conjunction with other authentication mechanisms -- can provide a reliable mechanism for ensuring a user is who he or she claims to be, said David Pedigo, senior manager of the Sabre Group, at Intel's launch of the Pentium III processor in San Jose, Calif., Wednesday.

"Passwords and cookies can be burned. We have contracts with travel agents in good faith, and we have agreements with foreign governments by treaty requiring us to charge tariffs on transactions," said Andrew Abate, director of applied technology at the Sabre Group. These contracts and treaties require a reliable authentication mechanism to determine who the Sabre Group is doing business with.

The Sabre Group demonstrated a prototype application for travel agents that reads the chip serial number in combination with passwords, to determine who's logged into a system, then displays customized fares and travel packages.

Computer Associates demonstrated an asset-management plug-in for its Unicenter TNG enterprise management tool. Reading the processor serial number augments the existing asset-tracking tools, such as serial numbers on disk drives and NICs, to provide a unique identifier for each PC. Disk drives and NICs can be changed, but the processor determines what applications and operating system should be on each PC, said David J.P. Corriveau, senior vice president of R&D at CA, in Islandia, N.Y.

"It's never been locked in this way before," Corriveau said. "Even the BIOS can be changed by people who want to impersonate another system."

The CA software -- available immediately at no additional cost as part of Unicenter TNG -- will be useful for simple inventory. That becomes more important for companies as the year 2000 approaches and companies need to know precisely what systems are deployed where, as a first step to determining how Y2K-compliant those systems are.

The software will also be useful for installing OSes and applications remotely. Systems administrators can just plug a new PC onto the network, and Unicenter TNG will read the serial number off the chip and download the appropriate software over the network.

The serial number scheme has come under fire from privacy advocates, who say it will slash consumer privacy over the Internet, enabling companies and governments to track what a user does online. Privacy advocates have called for a boycott of the chip, and asked the federal government to block shipments.

Intel said it is encouraging PC vendors to ship Pentium III systems with the serial number feature switched off, and is also providing software utilities to enable users to get control of who can access their serial numbers.

"This serial number is not broadcast, nor is it generally available. It is only available if the consumer allows it to be available," said Mike Aymar, vice president and director of platform-launching organization.