The company issued a short statement Thursday in response to a New York Times article reporting that the company was in negotiations to be bought by storage vendor EMC.

"RSA Security is currently engaged in negotiations with parties regarding a potential strategic transaction," the statement said. "No definitive agreement has been reached."

The Times article (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/29/technology/29deal.html?ex=1309233600&en=1d16162fd39c3ce1&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss), which appeared on Thursday, said that RSA was near a deal with EMC worth US$1.8 billion, but that other companies may be in the running. RSA's board was reported to be meeting Thursday or Friday to review final bids for the company.

In its statement, RSA cautioned that it was possible that no agreement would be reached to sell the company, or that the company's board of directors could reject the offer. RSA would not make any announcements until the board had approved a deal and entered into a definitive agreement to acquire RSA, the statement said.

Founded in 1986 by encryption luminaries Ronald Rivest, Adi Shamir, and Leonard Adelman, RSA is best known as an early proponent of the use of public key cryptography and as a maker of strong authentication technology such as smart cards and the popular SecurID tokens, which generate one-time passwords that are combined with traditional user names and passwords to provide stronger login security.