This integration will allow customers of VeriSign’s service to rely on their users’ mobile devices — cell phones, PDAs, and laptop PCs — for authentication, instead of having to deploy additional hardware such as USB devices or smart cards, according to company officials. An enterprise’s mobile users, business partners and customers can take advantage of this soft token installed on their devices for secure access to applications and Web sites.

With this announcement, MobiSecure acts as the online access authenticator to VeriSign’s service, helping to protect users from phishing thefts and identity theft that can result from entering information into unsecured applications and Web sites, officials say. MobiSecure complies with reference architecture established by the initiative for Open AuTHentication (OATH) and the HOTP algorithm currently under review at the IETF, company officials say.

MobiSecure works with handheld devices including Black Berries, PDAs that run Windows Mobile Computing or Palm OS, and phones that use Symbian and Java software.

VeriSign’s Unified Authentication services is a platform for provisioning and managing two-factor authentication credentials. The company would not say when a version of its service that includes MobiSecure will be commercially available.