Generic Security Service Application Programming Interface
(GSS-Api) An application level interface (Api) to system security services. It provides a generic interface to services which may be provided by a variety of different security mechanisms. Vanilla GSS-Api supports security contexts between two entities (known as "principals"). GSS-Api is a draft internet standard which is being developed in the Common Authentication Technology Working Group (cat-wg) of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). Initial specifications for GSS-Api appeared in RFC 1508 and RFC 1509. Subsequent revisions appeared in several draft standards documents. . (1996-05-19)