On Wed, 2005-11-16 at 11:04 +0100, Hernath Szabolcs wrote:

Thanks Hernath, thats a very interesting idea.

Is it necessary for the start and end dates to be the same as the
original ? Means I cannot use the OpenCA gui to create it but thats not
too much of a problem.

Would make life a lot easier !

David

> Hi All,
> 
> On Tue, 15 Nov 2005, silverhairbp wrote:
> 
> >
> >
> > David Bannon wrote:
> >
> >> Folks, I would like to ask for some advice here. We have a problem and
> >> below is our plan to solve it. I'd be very grateful if you could have a
> >> look at it and let me know if you see anything thats going to bite us
> >> expectantly.
> >> 
> >> The problem
> >> -----------
> >> We use OpenCA 0.9.2 and it was setup some 12 months ago using default
> >> settings. Our CA Certificate was originally issued without the necessary
> >> parameter of keyUsage being 'critical'.
> >> 
> >> The solution
> >> ------------
> >> Revoke all 220 certificates, revoke the CA Certificate, issue a new CA
> >> certificate (using existing key) and issue new certificates to users.
> I think you should not do that. If the only thing you want to change is 
> technical parameters in your root cert, but otherwise use the same 
> keypair, you essentially maintain the trust based on the the signatures 
> made with your original signing key. In other words, you do not need to 
> revoke anything, instead you simply reissue your root cert with the same 
> DN, serial, keypair and validity dates and changed technical parameters 
> (e.g., fixing the keyUsage, changing the signature algorithm etc). In this 
> way, signatures made with the old or new root certs will validate against 
> either of them. The already issued certificates will not be effected.
> 
> Besides, there is no point in revoking a self-signed certificate anyway, 
> in case you want to terminate the trust associated with the signatures 
> made with a CA's signing key before the expiration of the root cert 
> (emergency key changeover), you revoke all issued certificates (except the 
> root), publish a last valid CRL, destroy all copies of the CA signing key, 
> and start anew with a fresh PKI.
> 
> If you only want to terminate the usage of a CA's signing key -without 
> disruption of the trust associated with its signatures- (routine key 
> changeover), you can harmonize various validity dates and CRL issuance 
> frequency such that you can keep your usual operating procedures (issuing 
> CRLs as usual) and let all certs (issued and root) expire. Before that 
> happens, you already start your fresh PKI in parrallel with some useful 
> overlap time.
> 
> Good Luck,
> Cheers
> 
> Szabolcs
> 
> P.S.: as a sidenote, if the keypair of sub-CA is actually compromised in a 
> multilevel hierarchy (as opposed to having some flags misconfigured), I 
> would definitely *revoke* the sub-CA's root certificate for good, not only 
> suspend it. The keypair is the root of your trust - if it's compromised, 
> your pki (under that sub-CA's level) is over.
> 
> >> The Plan
> >> ------------
> >> We have established that we can generate a new CA Certificate and OpenCA
> >> (0.9.2) is quite happy. So this is what we'll do, steps 1 - 3 (below)
> >> must be done before implementation date.
> >> 
> >> 
> >> 1) Encourage all end users and RA Operators to lodge new requests for
> >> new certificates. 
> >> 2) Ordinary users must meet (again) with RA Operators to show photo ID.
> >> RAO must authorise new applications in normal manner.
> >> 
> >> 3) CA Operators and CA Manager will phone RAOs to explicitly confirm
> >> details of their own personal applications, in normal manner.
> >> 
> >> ------ Implementation Day --------
> >> 
> >> 4) On the CA machine, move the existing CA Certificate files
> >> (from /var/crypto/cacerts) out of the way. Their details will remain in
> >> the database. Start openCA, make a new request for a self signed
> >> certificate  and then Generate it. (General->Initialization->Request
> >> Setup, Certificate Setup).
> >> 
> >> 5) On RA, revoke all user certificates and process to CA.
> >> 
> >> 6) On RA, revoke the old CA Certificate and process to CA.
> >> 
> >> 7) Commence issuing the backlog of certificate requests currently
> >> pending, in the normal manner.
> >> 
> >> Although we will aim for completing this process in one day, I doubt we
> >> will be able to do so.
> >> 
> >> --------------------
> >> 
> >> I'll be very grateful for any comments you care to make.
> >> 
> >> David
> >> 
> >
> > Rather than revoking the original CA certificate, have you considerd 
> > suspending it to see if there are any user that have not installed their 
> > new 
> > certificates?  It would be easy to roll back the old root cert and convert 
> > that last users, repead the suspend root process until all users are 
> > converted.  That way you can motivate slow converters to get new 
> > certificates 
> > while minimizing their down time.
> >
> > As a suggestion, when deploying the new hierarchy, manage the validity 
> > period 
> > closely so taht you can migrate to a new root without a lot of hassle.  
> > There 
> > are papers on the technique available.
> >
> > Bill
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > -------------------------------------------------------
> > This SF.Net email is sponsored by the JBoss Inc.  Get Certified Today
> > Register for a JBoss Training Course.  Free Certification Exam
> > for All Training Attendees Through End of 2005. For more info visit:
> > http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7628&alloc_id=16845&op=click
> > _______________________________________________
> > Openca-Users mailing list
> > [email protected]
> > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/openca-users
> >
> 
> 
> -------------------------------------------------------
> This SF.Net email is sponsored by the JBoss Inc.  Get Certified Today
> Register for a JBoss Training Course.  Free Certification Exam
> for All Training Attendees Through End of 2005. For more info visit:
> http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7628&alloc_id=16845&op=click
> _______________________________________________
> Openca-Users mailing list
> [email protected]
> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/openca-users



-------------------------------------------------------
This SF.Net email is sponsored by the JBoss Inc.  Get Certified Today
Register for a JBoss Training Course.  Free Certification Exam
for All Training Attendees Through End of 2005. For more info visit:
http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=7628&alloc_id=16845&op=click
_______________________________________________
Openca-Users mailing list
[email protected]
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/openca-users

Reply via email to