Sun Microsystems Netscape Enterprise Server, Administrator'S Manual

Page: 123 / 532

Chapter 5, Working with Server Security 123
Installing and Managing Certificates
• Organizational Unit is an optional field that describes an organization
within your company. This can also be used to note a less formal company
name (without the
Inc. , Corp. , and so on).
• Locality is an optional field that usually describes the city, principality, or
country for the organization.
• State or Province is usually required, but can be optional for some CAs.
Note that most CAs won’t accept abbreviations, but check with them to be
sure.
• Country is a required, two-character abbreviation of your country name (in
ISO format). The country code for the United States is US.
All this information is combined as a series of attribute-value pairs called the
distinguished name (DN), which uniquely identifies the subject of the
certificate.
If you are purchasing your certificate from a commercial CA, you must contact
the CA to find out what additional information they require before they issue a
certificate. Most CAs require that you prove your identity. For example, they
want to verify your company name and who is authorized by the company to
administer the server, and they might ask whether you have the legal right to
use the information you provide.
Some commercial CAs offer certificates that indicate a greater level of detail and
veracity to vendors or individuals who provide greater proof of their identity.
For example, you might be able to purchase a certificate stating that the CA has
not only verified that you are the rightful administrator of the www.mozilla.com
computer, but that you really are a company that has been in business for ten
years and have no outstanding customer litigation against you. Generally, these
certificates cost more than standard ones.
Installing and Managing Certificates
There are three types of certificates that you can install:
• Your own server’s certificate to present to clients.
• A CA’s own certificate for use in a certificate chain.
Each of these certificates is installed through the process described here.