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Revocation
revoked or can revoke all certificates in the list. The end user can also specify
additional details, such as the date of revocation and revocation reason for
each certificate or for the list as a whole. For instructions on how end users
revoke their certificates, see the online help available by clicking the Help
buttons in the end-entity forms.
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Agents can revoke certificates based on a range of serial numbers or based on
one or more subject name components. Upon submission of the revocation
request, agents receive a list of certificates from which they can pick the ones to
be revoked. For instructions on how agents revoke end-entity certificates, see
the CMS Agent's Guide.
Upon receiving the list of certificates to be revoked, the Registration Manager
creates a CMMF request and sends it to the Certificate Manager. The Certificate
Manager marks the corresponding certificate records in its internal database as
revoked, and if configured to do so, removes the revoked certificates from the
publishing directory and updates the CRL in the publishing directory.
Authentication of End Users During Certificate
Revocation
When an end user submits a certificate revocation request, the first step in the
revocation process is for the Certificate Manager or Registration Manager to
identify and authenticate the end user to verify that the user is attempting to
revoke his or her own certificate, not a certificate belonging to someone else.
Both the Certificate Manager and Registration Manager support the SSL Client
Authenticated Revocation and the Challenge-Password-Based Revocation.
SSL Client Authenticated Revocation
In an SSL client authenticated revocation method, the server expects the end user
to present a certificate that has the same subject name as the one they wants to
revoke and uses that for authentication purposes. The server verifies the
authenticity of a revocation request by mapping the subject name in the certificate
being presented for client authentication to certificates in its internal database. The
server revokes the certificate only if the certificate maps successfully to one or more
valid or expired certificates in its internal database.
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Netscape Certificate Management System Administrator's Guide • February 2003
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