Microsoft® Windows® 2000 Security Handbook

Summary

Now you have learned almost everything about the Security Support Provider Interface. You have seen how easy it is to add strong security to your applications. The SSPI is a universal tool available to any layers above the transport layer. You can even write your own security provider; you just have to implement the functions listed in the security function table, which was discussed at the beginning of the chapter.

Before you proceed to the next chapter, where CryptoAPI, the Cryptographic API, is discussed, let me warn you against using the SSPI directly if you are working with high-level communication APIs and libraries. Some of them, such as COM/DCOM, have good sets of functions that implement the security in a more convenient way ...