Communicator Help: Using AOL<sup><font size=-2>®</font></sup> Communicator Identity Manager

Contents | Index | Tutorial Movies

Using AOL Communicator Identity Manager

Certificate Properties

The Certificate Properties dialog box displays information about a certificate and allows you to edit the certificate's trust settings.

To view the properties or edit the trust settings for any certificate listed in Identity Manager, select the certificate and click Properties.

General Tab
Details Tab
Trust Tab

General Tab

When you first open Certificate Properties, the General tab displays several kinds of information about the selected certificate:

Certificate Verification: See Controlling Certificate Validation for a discussion of how AOL Communicator verifies certificates. "Verified Purposes" can include any of the following:

- SSL Client Certificate: Certificate used to identify you to web sites.
- SSL Server Certificate: Certificate used to identify a web site server to E-mail Signer Certificate: Certificate used to identify you for the purposes of digitally signing e-mail messages.
- E-mail Recipient Certificate: Certificate used to identify someone else, for example so you can send that person encrypted e-mail.
- E-mail Signer Certificate: Certificate used to identify you, for example when you send someone else encrypted e-mail.
- Status Responder Certificate: Certificate used to identify an online status responder that uses the Online Certificate Status Protocol (OCSP) to check the validity of certificates. For more information about OCSP, see Certificate Validation Preferences.
- SSL Certificate Authority: Certificate used to identify a certificate authority—that is, a service that issues certificates for use as identification over computer networks.

Certificate Summary: This section of the General Tab summarizes the following information about the certificate. To examine the certificate contents in more details, click the Details tab:

- Issued By: Summarizes information (similar to that provided under "Issued To"; see above) about the certificate authority (CA) that issued the certificate.
- Issued To: Summarizes the following information about the certificate:

- Common Name: The name of the person or other entity that the certificate identifies.
- Organization: The name of the organization to which the entity belongs (such as the name of a company).
- Organizational Unit: The name of the organizational unit to which the entity belongs (such as Accounting Department).
- Serial Number: The certificate's serial number.

- Validity: Indicates the period during which the certificate is valid.
- Fingerprints: Lists the certificate's fingerprints. A fingerprint is a unique number produced by applying a mathematical function to the certificate contents. A certificate's fingerprint can be used to verify that the certificate has not been tampered with.

<< back to top

Details Tab

Click the Details tab at the top of Certificate Properties to see more detailed information about the selected certificate. To examine information for any certificate in the Certificate Hierarchy area, select its name, select the field under Certificate Fields that you want to examine, and read the field's value under Field Value.

Certificate Hierarchy: Displays the certificate chain, with the certificate you originally selected at the bottom. A certificate chain is a hierarchical series of certificates signed by successive certificate authorities (CAs). A CA certificate identifies a certificate authority and is used to sign certificates issued by that authority. A CA certificate can in turn be signed by the CA certificate of a parent CA and so on up to a root CA.

Certificate Fields: Displays the fields of the certificate selected under Certificate Hierarchy.

Field Value: Displays the value of the field selected under Certificate Fields.

The Certificate Viewer displays basic ANSI types in human-readable form wherever possible. For fields whose contents the Certificate Manager cannot interpret, it displays the actual values contained in the certificate.

<< back to top

Trust Tab

The Trust tab allows you to view and edit the trust settings for the certificate whose properties you are viewing and all the related certificates in its certificate chain. If you make any changes to trust settings shown in this tab, you must click OK to confirm them.

A certificate chain is a hierarchical series of certificates signed by successive certificate authorities. A CA certificate identifies a certificate authority (CA) and is used to sign certificates issued by that authority. A CA certificate can in turn be signed by the CA certificate of a parent CA and so on up to a root CA.

Certificate Hierarchy and Trust Settings: This portion of the Trust tab displays the certificate chain.

To make sure all the certificates in the chain are visible, make sure all the triangles beside the issuer names are pointing downward. If a triangle is pointing sideways, click it once to display the certificate from that issuer.

The checkboxes beside each certificate indicate what purposes it is trusted for. The effect of selecting a checkbox in one of the three columns depends on the type of certificate and its position in the certificate chain:

- E-mail: If this checkbox is selected for the bottom certificate, AOL Communicator trusts the certificate when it is used to sign or encrypt e-mail messages or instant messages.
  If this checkbox is not selected for the bottom certificate, AOL Communicator does not trust the certificate for this purpose.
  If this checkbox is selected for any CA certificate in the chain, AOL Communicator trusts all certificates issued by the corresponding CA for the purpose of signing or encrypting e-mail.
  If this checkbox is not selected for a CA certificate, AOL Communicator does not trust any e-mail certificates issued by the corresponding CA.
- SSL: If this checkbox is selected for the bottom certificate, AOL Communicator trusts the certificate when it is used to identify web sites or encrypt web site connections. (This may be helpful, for example, when you have specified a secure connection for mail account server.)
  If this checkbox is not selected for the bottom certificate, AOL Communicator does not trust the certificate for this purpose.
  If this checkbox is selected for any CA certificate in the chain, AOL Communicator trusts all certificates issued by the corresponding CA for the purpose of identifying web sites and encrypting web site connections.
  If this checkbox is not selected for a CA certificate, AOL Communicator does not trust any web site certificates issued by the corresponding CA.
- Software: If this checkbox is selected for the bottom certificate, AOL Communicator trusts the certificate when it is used to identify software developers or publishers.
  If this checkbox is not selected, AOL Communicator does not trust the certificate for this purpose.
  If this checkbox is selected for any CA certificate in the chain, AOL Communicator trusts all certificates issued by the corresponding CA for the purpose of identifying software developers or publishers.
  If this checkbox is not selected for a CA certificate, AOL Communicator does not trust any certificates issued by this CA for this purpose

Trust details for the selected certificate: When you select a certificate in "Certificate Hierarchy and Trust Settings" area near the top of the tab, more detailed trust information appears in this area.

<< back to top

The sections in this document that discuss security, encryption, and privacy are provided by AOL for your information only. They may help you take certain steps to protect the privacy and security of your personal information on the Internet. This document does not, however, address all online privacy and security issues, nor does it represent a recommendation by AOL about what constitutes adequate privacy and security protection on the Internet.

© 2002-2003 America Online, Inc. All rights reserved. Trademark Information

Last Updated September 16, 2003