Abstract: A system and method for establishing secure communications between two entities, such as a server and a client, may involve the use of an intermediate gateway. Each party may establish a secure communication link with the gateway, and the gateway may provide signed certificates to each party, each certificate identifying the gateway as the other party for purposes of the communication. The gateway may then facilitate the secure communications between the two parties, and may perform data translation on the communications. The identification information may be contained within the certificates used by the gateway.

Abstract: A method of authenticating a client (42) and a server (44) to each other via a gateway (46) in which the client uses a first encryption protocol between itself and the gateway and the server uses a second different encryption protocol between itself and the gateway, the method comprising the steps of: installing in the server that the gateway is a trusted certification authority (48); the gateway issuing a digital certificate authenticating the client; and the server verifying the digital certificate in order to confirm to itself that the digital certificate comes from the trusted certification authority.