In cryptography, a certificate authority or certification authority (CA) is an entity that issues digital certificates.

A digital certificate certifies the ownership of a public key by the named subject of the certificate.

This allows others (relying parties) to rely upon signatures or on assertions made about the private key that corresponds to the certified public key.

A CA acts as a trusted third party—trusted both by the subject (owner) of the certificate and by the party relying upon the certificate.

The format of these certificates is specified by the X.509 standard.

The Internet Security Research Group (ISRG) is a California public-benefit corporation which focuses on Internet security.

Transport Layer Security (TLS) and its predecessor, Secure Sockets Layer (SSL), both frequently referred to as "SSL", are cryptographic protocols that provide communications security over a computer network.

Several versions of the protocols find widespread use in applications such as web browsing, email, Internet faxing, instant messaging, and voice-over-IP (VoIP).

Websites use TLS to secure all communications between their servers and web browsers.

Intuitive Surgical Inc. is an American corporation that manufactures robotic surgical systems, most notably the da Vinci Surgical System.

The da Vinci Surgical System allows surgery to be performed using robotic manipulators.

The company is part of the NASDAQ-100 and S&P 500.

Intuitive Surgical has installed over 1,242 systems worldwide as of July, 2009.

Computer Motion was a competitor that merged with Intuitive Surgical in 2003.

In cryptography, encryption is the process of encoding a message or information in such a way that only authorized parties can access it.

Encryption does not of itself prevent interference, but denies the intelligible content to a would-be interceptor.

In an encryption scheme, the intended information or message, referred to as plaintext, is encrypted using an encryption algorithm, generating ciphertext that can only be read if decrypted.

For technical reasons, an encryption scheme usually uses a pseudo-random encryption key generated by an algorithm.

It is in principle possible to decrypt the message without possessing the key, but, for a well-designed encryption scheme, considerable computational resources and skills are required.

An authorized recipient can easily decrypt the message with the key provided by the originator to recipients but not to unauthorized users.