Ken
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If we need to hash it, it should be in plain text. This is from a cut and paste of the document (the footnotes have been automatically converted!)
3.2.3 Trust and Accountability
An important aspect of the relationship between participants
in a social structure is the trust that they have in their interactions with
each other. Trust arises in situations where one actor interacts with another
actor with the objective of getting the latter to perform some task or achieve
some goal on behalf[D1] of the
former.
Goal Adoption
An actor may adopt a goal as a result of interacting with
another actor.
[D2]
A consequence of an actor adopting a goal on behalf of another
actor is that the actor becomes accountable to the latter for the successful
satisfaction of the goal.
Accountability
An actor is accountable to another actor when the former
consents to achieve an identified 938
goal.
[D3]
It is important to note that the goal adopted by one actor
as a result of an interaction need not be the same goal as that of the
originating actor. In many situations, the adopted goal is not all the same and
may even be contrary to the desires of the original actor.
For example, if an actor wishes to use a third party to
securely transmit a message to an interaction partner, the actor needs the
intermediary to adopt the goal of transmitting the message, potentially without
even being aware of the actual goals involved.[D4]
The foundation for successful interaction of this form
between actors is their mutual trust in each other – counter-balanced by the
risks perceived.
Trust
Trust is an actor’s private perception of the commitment [D5] another
actor has to a goal together with an identifiable set of real world effects
associated with that goal.
Typically, it is not important to know how the real world
effect may be realized, as the specific actions required may be private, but
the trusting actor believes that these actions will be sufficient to result in
the goal being satisfied.
Trust should not be confused with the simpler, more
technical concept, of one participant trusting that their partner in an
interaction is who they purport to be. [D6]
Trust Decision[D7] 956
A trust decision is an internal action performed by an actor
to make a commitment to perform an action in the future.
When making a choice whether or not to trust an actor many
factors may be important – an assessment of the trustworthiness of the parties
involved, an assessment of the risks involved and a balance of the merits of
making the choice.
Evidence of Trust
Evidence of trust is the set of observable assertions[D8] that a
stakeholder may use to measure trust.
Trust is based on evidence available to the trusting actor[D9] . The evidence may be physical artifacts
or a set of information from which the trusting actor can assess the degree of
trust. The evidence may include a
history of previous interaction with the trusting actor or can be based on the
public reputation reflecting the experience of others in dealing with the
prospective actor.
Reputation 968
A social expression of the perception of trust.[D10]
Trust is not binary, i.e. an actor is neither completely
trusted nor untrusted, because there is typically some degree of uncertainty in
the accuracy or completeness of the evidence. Trust is based on the confidence
the trusting actor has in the accuracy and sufficiency of the gathered
evidence.
The degree of trust exists as a property of the trusting
actor with respect to another actor or class of actors; the reputation of an
actor or class of actors may predispose the trusting actor to a certain extent.
If the trusting actor is aware that actions by numerous
other actors are required in order to realize certain real world effects, the
collection of trust applicable to each step may be considered a chain of trust.
Chain of Trust
A chain of trust is an extended set of trust relationships
between actors in which one actor trusts another by virtue of the fact that
there is one or more intermediaries that are, in turn, trusted by the original
trusting actor and also trust the target actor.
[D11]
Typically, chains of trust do not extend very far as the
issues involved in perceiving the true intentions of actors are complex and
inherently opaque.
Risk
Risk is an actor’s private perception that another actor’s
actions will impede the first actor’s objectives.[D12]
An actorʼs actions
are based on a combination of perceived trust and perceived risk. If there is
little or no perceived risk, then the degree of trust may not be relevant in
assessing possible actions. For
example, most people consider there to be an acceptable level of risk to
privacy when using search engines, and submit queries without any sense of
trust being considered.
As perceived risk increases, the issue of trust becomes more
of a consideration. There are recognized risks in providing or accepting credit
cards as payment, and standard procedures have been put in place to increase
trust or, at a minimum, bringing trust and risk into balance by mitigating
risk. For interactions with a high degree of risk, the trusting actor requires
stronger or additional evidence when evaluating the balance between risk and
trust when deciding whether to participate in an interaction.
[D1]The
Trusting Actor wants the Trusted Actor to do something. It is not necessarily
something on behalf of the Trusting Actor but just something the Trusted Actor
is prepared to do.
>>>> Actually, while I agree completely that actors do what they want to do, I think that there is no trust involved if there is no connection between the actors over what one is going to do for the other.
[D2]The
Trusted Actor does not adopt the goals of the Trusting Actor but rather acts
according to its own goals. If the
Trusted Actor is engaged in a phishing con, its goals have nothing to do with
the Trusting Actor’s goals. In
many cases, including legitimate ones, the Trusted Actor already has goals and
is merely acting to satisfy these and adopting nothing.
>>>> Again, stipulated that actors do their own thing; which may well be at variance with the intent of the trusting actor. However, trust must be about something that both actors can relate to. Even if the result is to break the trust, there must be something to break!
[D3]This
is only true if accountability is part of the agreed to interaction. The perception of accountability is
part of reputation.
>>>> There very likely to be limits to accountability. The concept itself refers to the stance that the actors have to each other after agreement. I do not think that accountability should be mixed in with reputation.
[D4]Again,
if my business is to transmit messages, I will transmit yours because that is
my existing goal. Transmitting
your message satisfies my goal.
>>>> Of course, that is what I was trying to communicate
[D5]A
sense of the Trusted Actor’s commitment may affect my perception of trust and
risk, but my trust is in seeing real world effects I want. The real world effects the Trusted
Actor wants is private to them and not directly my interest.
>>>> We are trying to nail down what it means to trust another actor; not whether or not the actor is trustworthy.
[D6]Unnecessary
here.
>>>> Perhaps. But I do feel that the IT version of trust is not what we are addressing here.
[D7]This
is akin to the Degree of Balance I introduced
>>>> I know. I was trying to codify the important concepts in trusting someone. I feel that the decision is the pivot and the evidence is the lever.
[D8]Real
world effects. What is observable
per the RM is shared state.
>>>> Shared state is the set of facts that is potentially knowable by the parties involved. State itself is observed by making observations of the world -- a fact in a shared state is measurable or it is of no interest to us.
[D9]This
should be formally defined and used consistently.
>>>> Agreed.
[D10]This
is too mushy. Prefer defining as
an accumulation of observations of real world effects.
>>>> Reputation is inherently social. I am in favour of tightening this up; but do not want to lose the social aspect. Reputation, like trust, is based on evidence but is not the same thing as that evidence.
[D11]Disagree
for SOA. I trust the actor with
whom I interact. The “chain” is
typically private and unknown to me.
If the Trusted Actor wants to expose private details, that may affect my
perception of trust and risk but any assumption that this is required will
violate opacity.
>>>> This was included because of David's concerns. Strongly related to service composition.
[D12]You’ve
now introduced objectives! Risk
needs to be in terms of undesirable real world effects in order to tie all this
together.
>>>> Sure, no problem. I used it objectives as short hand for desired RWEs. There is risk of not producing desired results, and risk of producing undesired results.
smime.p7s
