Certificate Authority

Full Title or Meme

Any computer service that can evaluate and issue certificates to any Entity, either natural or otherwise, with some sort of digital Identifier.

Context

• Typically, certificates are issued in compliance with CCITT X509 standards in support of a Public Key Infrastructure.
• Efforts started in 2024 are focused on finding other solutions which might mean CCITT X.509 type certification in JSON structure.
• Other effort to create various types of a Trust Registry are starting to look a lot like a Certificate Authority.

Problems

1. Enhanced Security Verification - When you connect to a website, browsers like **Chrome** not only verify that a recognized Certificate Authority (CA) issued the certificate but also perform additional checks on the connection's security properties. - One such check involves validating data from Certificate Transparency logs. These logs help detect any mis-issuance of certificates after they are in production.
2. Post-Issuance Validation - CT works within the existing CA infrastructure to provide **post-issuance validation** of an entity's authorization for SSL certificate issuance. - By monitoring these logs, domain owners can identify any unauthorized or suspicious certificates associated with their domains.
3. Privacy Concerns - Public CAs maintain **Certificate Transparency logs**, which are publicly accessible and searchable. - Some organizations prefer to use their **internal certificate authorities** to avoid having their internal host-names appear in these public logs.
4. Future Adoption - While most CAs currently support CT primarily for Extended Validation EV Certs, there is a possibility of extending it to all SSL certificates in the future.

In summary, the move toward **Certificate Transparency** aims to bolster security, increase transparency, and ensure the integrity of SSL certificates across the web.