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Fundamental Security for Your Certificate PKI Environment

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Background information

Most organizations today rely on certificates in one form or another. The most well-known certificates are TLS/SSL certificates, encryption and signing certificates. Digital certificates are also used for digital signatures and help comply with regulatory requirements globally.

A TLS/SSL certificate is a digital certificate that enables an encrypted connection between sender and receiver, a good example of this is when you visit a website that uses certificates to encrypt traffic between the web server and your browser. It is also important to have a digital signature from a recognized CA to verify the authenticity of signed documents.

Unfortunately, we see many PKI solutions implemented as a next-next-next-next installation. The solution will probably work technically, but in terms of security it's often the equivalent of buying a safe and putting the key on top.

To ensure the integrity of your PKI infrastructure, it's important that the architecture, security and processes surrounding the PKI infrastructure are in order.

Examples of this could be:

Digital certificates lifecycle

Certificates have a short lifespan of typically 1-2 years, it is important to have an overview of expiration and metadata for the certificates that are issued so that renewal can be done in a timely and controlled manner. It is also crucial to check the validity of the certificates to ensure that they are still valid and trusted. If there is no control over the lifecycle, the worst-case scenario could end in a major incident.

HSM (Hardware security Module)

Certificates are all about integrity and trusting the sender by ensuring that the private key of the certificate has not been misused or compromised. An HSM helps ensure the security of the storage of the private key.

Code signing with digital signature

If you use codesigning certificates in your organization, it's important to have an overview of where and who has access to sign software. Digital signatures are used to verify the identity of a sender in digital documents, and digital certificates are crucial to this process. If this is not controlled, there is a risk that others can misuse your keys to sign malicious software in your name.

Public key encryption

If you use encryption in your business, it's important to ensure that you can also recover data if de-encryption keys are lost. Encrypted information is sent using digital certificates and encryption methods, where the public key in a digital certificate can be used by third parties to send encrypted information that only the owner of the private key can decrypt. This emphasizes the importance of encryption in secure communications between websites and users. If this part is not taken care of, it can lead to data loss in the worst case scenario.

Disaster recovery for digital certificates

We see several solutions where downtime and recovery procedures are non-existent or even lacking. Validating information is essential to ensure the integrity and credibility of the PKI infrastructure, which emphasizes the role of a trusted Certificate Authority (CA). If the PKI solution is not tested, you risk being left with a solution that cannot be restored. Once the PKI infrastructure is set up, it's difficult to change the configuration, so it's important to start right. If your solution has started off on the wrong foot, we can usually help you fix it so that security and integrity are maintained.

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