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Required CA Information
Before you begin the request process, make sure you know what information your
CA requires. Whether you are requesting a server certificate from a commercial CA
or an internal CA, you need to provide the following information:
•
Common Name must be the fully qualified hostname used in DNS lookups
(for example, www.example.com). This is the hostname in the URL that a
browser uses to connect to your site. If these two names don't match, a client is
notified that the certificate name doesn't match the site name, creating doubt
about the authenticity of your certificate. Some CAs might have different
requirements, so it's important to check with them.
You can also enter wildcard and regular expressions in this field if you are
requesting a certificate from an internal CA. Most vendors would not approve
a certificate request with a wildcard or regular expression entered for common
name.
•
Email Address is your business email address. This is used for correspondence
between you and the CA.
•
Organization is the official, legal name of your company, educational
institution, partnership, and so on. Most CAs require that you verify this
information with legal documents (such as a copy of a business license).
•
Organizational Unit is an optional field that describes an organization within
your company. This can also be used to note a less formal companya 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.
Requesting and Installing Other Server Certificates
Chapter 5
Securing Your Enterprise Server
95
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