Security of internet banking and prevention of fraud and cyber-crime is now a purely competitive issue between banks, with Westpac's co-operative trust centre project now officially dead. At least two senior trust centre executives have left Westpac for self employment while the official line from Westpac is that the project was "a bit before its time" and is being brought back "in-house". In an email yesterday a spokeswoman for Westpac wrote that "The Trust Centre initiative was established so Australian banks could conduct shared cyber-crime prevention and identity management collaboratively through a trusted third-party entity."It remains our view that the Trust Centre vision still holds great promise, however the industry is not yet ready to embrace this vision to enable it to become a reality."In light of this, a decision has been made to bring a number of the great initiatives started by the centre back into the Westpac fold."She said the Trust Centre's proposals around PKI (public key infrastructure) were essentially sound and would form the basis of further work within the bank.Catherine Martsch was the original chief executive and main driver of the project that was planned to evolve into an independent entity wholesaling identity management back to the banks. She is believed to have left Westpac, although wasn't returning calls yesterday. While Westpac provided seed funding for the project, it was believed to have received some at least in principle support from St George, NAB, and CBA.  ANZ was never partial to the co-operative idea and always maintained that internet banking security was a legitimate area for competition.