What Will A CA Expect Of You?

Any PKI worth its salt must be rooted in appropriate and judicious uses of digital certificates. You''ll define what this means to you in how you''ll use digital certificates within (and outside) your organization. To that end, you must specify -- in exacting detail -- for what purposes digital certificates will be used (secure e-mail, access control, document signing, etc.), who is authorized to request digital certificates, what information they must present to prove their identity or their rights, how long certificates will be valid, and a host of other variables.

Because you''re the one who operates the systems which contain the data that''ll be used to check credentials, you''ll need resources that can hook-in to CA systems to communicate approvals and decline decisions. This activity alone is anything but trivial!