Initialize a User

When a user is first assigned to a partner, the status of the user is New. After the user sends both the INI and HIA requests to the bank, the status is changed to Initialized in the bank's system.

A bank enters into a contract with its trading partners. The contract defines the terms and conditions of business transactions agreed upon between the bank and the trading partner. The bank does not yet have the user's public certificates. The transmission of the user's public certificates to the bank's system is necessary for the initialization of the user.

The supported versions for the identification and authentication, Electronic Signature (ES), and encryption are components of the bank parameters. The user's bank-technical key must be newly generated if the user does not have a suitable bank-technical key or does not want to use an existing bank-technical key for the new bank connection. The same applies for the identification and authentication and encryption keys.

The user transmits the public certificates to the financial institution through two independent communication paths:
  • INI: Sends the public bank-technical key.
  • HIA: Sends the public identification and authentication key and the public encryption key.

When the user is first assigned to a partner, the status of the user is New. If the user sends only the INI request to the bank, the status is changed to Partly Initialized (INI). If the user sends only the HIA request to the bank, the status is changed to Partly Initialized (HIA). After the user sends both the INI and HIA requests to the bank, the status is changed to Initialized in the bank's system.

The user generates the INI and HIA letters with the hash value of the keys using the Sterling B2B Integrator EBICS Client dashboard interface, manually signs them and mails the letters to the bank. When the bank receives the initialization letters of INI and HIA, it verifies the hash values in the letters against its database. After successful verification, the status of the user is set to Ready in the bank's system, indicating that the user can now transact with the bank. The user then downloads the bank's public certificates by using the HPB system order type and validates them using the Sterling B2B Integrator EBICS Client dashboard interface. After successful validation, the bank status is set to Activated, indicating that transaction with the bank is now possible.

The subscribers can retrieve information stored by the bank using HKD and HTD order types after the user status is set to Ready.