The philosophy of the GTA is to offer an infrastructure that will facilitate the evolution of cross border e-business in a secure environment where the liability incurred at both ends of the transaction chain is respected. The GTA Infrastructure is diagrammatically represented as follows:

In short, the GTA enables participating trading parties to establish a trusted electronic trading relationship. The basis of GTA is a Scheme Trust Authority (STA) offering an application (as part of a scheme) to end-users. To be able to use this application securely, the end-user receives a digital certificate. STAs are certified by a Master Trust Authority (MTA) in their own country or region. MTAs are certified by the GTA, which is the root of the hierarchy. Because all parties under the GTA umbrella trust this root, trusted relationships between all parties in the chain are guaranteed.

In summary, the essential characteristics of the GTA are:

		an infrastructure;
		a co-operative grouping currently comprised of financial sector institutions or associations in which financial sector institutions are shareholders;
		a creator and manager of a global root key;
		a creator of a minimum set of rules for MTA and STA interoperability and integrity;
		a certifier of MTAs, and a provider of a guarantee of MTA identity;
		a co-operative with limited liability;
		a co-operative registered in Belgium;
		an arbitrator of last resort for disputes between MTAs;
		independently audited.