Hello, We recently had yet another long discussion on a server cert working group call about what it means for a applicant's certificate to be on a "third party" website. This is the second time in recent history this requirement has been extensively discussed, and has been pointed out by several people, this requirement is trivially bypassable, and doesn't actually prove the CA is issuing certificates to the public, it just shows they are capable of issuing certs for a friend (or even an employee's personal site).
Ben Wilson suggested that the issued certificate could actually be one of the required test websites, and it would provide the same value in allowing the profile, issuance, and chaining to be examined. Remember, at this point, the issuance process has already been AUDITED by a third party, and a root program has accepted the audit. To the extent that the "third-party" requirement was intended to prove that a CA actively issues to arbitrary third parties, the current requirement does not do that (frankly, nor has it ever). If someone is interested in actually enforcing that CAs must be actively issuing certificates to arbitrary third parties, they can write up that requirement in a ballot and pass it. Here is a really simple solution: https://github.com/cabforum/forum/pull/34, which just removes the "third party" requirement, which allows what Ben proposed. Looking for endorsers. Also willing to accept other solutions, as long as we stop spending entire meetings discussing whether this requirement, which doesn't actually achieve anything, was met by some arbitrary new applicant. -Tim
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