Certificate Authority

Certificate Authority (CA)

• CA is a trusted entity that issues digital certificates to other organizations.
• It guarantees the individual who granted the unique character to create digital signatures and public-private keys.
• It plays an important role in e-commerce and data security as the CA guarantees that the two parties which would be exchanging the information are really the ones they claim to be.
• It contains special configuration data which regulate the CAs to which they are issued.

These configuration options can be:
1. Define organizational namespace in which certificates are issued by subordinate CA and can be issued and trusted.
2. Issued by subordinate CA it specifies the acceptable uses of certificates.
3. The issuance guidelines must be defined in order to follow a certificate that is issued by the subordinate CA is considered to be valid.
4. A managed trust can be created between separate certification hierarchies.