Académique Documents
Professionnel Documents
Culture Documents
Introduction
Concepts
Export and import profiles
Managing CAs
Export and import CAs
Remove and restore CA soft keystore
Renew CAs
Revoke CAs
Import users
CRL generation
CRL Update service worker
Cron job
Delta CRLs
Scep
Level of SCEP support
Tested devices
CMP (EJBCA >=3.4)
Configuration
CMP over http
CMP over TCP
User authentication
Proof of possession
Normal or RA mode for CMP
Certificate validity
Certificate Key Usage
Interoperability
CMP Proxy
Ocsp
Stand-alone OCSP responder
Simple OCSP client
Adobe Acrobat Reader
EJBCA Web Service Interface
Web Services authentication
Configuring Web Services CLI
Configuring Web Services behavior
Using the Web Services CLI
Using the Web Service API for Integration
Sample code
Accessrules required when using the Web Service API
Error codes on web services
WS transaction logging
XKMS Service
Introduction
How to configure the XKMS Service
Implementation Specific Notes
Using the XKMS client
Running the XKMS test script
External RA API
Key recovery
Technical details
Email notifications
End entity email notifications
Dynamic Substitution Variables
Examples
Printing of User Data
Approving Actions
Framework for External User Data Sources
Framework for Reports
Services Framework
Configuration
Currently Available Services
Writing Customized Services
Hardware Security Modules (HSM)
Auto-activation of CA tokens
HSMs and DSA or ECDSA
Generic PKCS#11 provider
Utimaco CryptoServer
nCipher nShield/netHSM
nCipher load balancing
AEP Keyper
ARX CoSign
Bull Trustway
SafeNet Luna
SafeNet ProtectServer
Writing support for new HSMs
LDAP and Publishers
LDAP Naming
LDAP Basics
Configure LDAP publishers
Extra device schema
Custom publishers
Publisher Queue and failures
ECDSA keys and signatures
Generated keys and certificate
Using ECDSA with an HSM
ECC named curves vs explicit parameters
Named curves
ImplicitlyCA curves
Creating client certificates
Limitations
Internationalization
Adding a new language to the admin GUI
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Internal Internationalization
Custom DN and altName oids
altNames
Custom Certificate Extensions
Configuring Custom Certificate Extensions
Basic Certificate Extension
Implementing an Advanced Certificate Extension
Logging
Log4JLogDevice
OldLogDevice
ProtectedLogDevice
Reference manual
Command line interface
Other Configuration
Asn1Dump
Batch creation of certificates
Fetching certificates and CRLs
Other deployment scenarios
Customizing EJBCA
Handling changes in a separate tree (EJBCA >= 3.5)
Adding your own public web-pages
Adding your own rules to regulate the values of End Entity Fields
Using the demo servlet
Samples
Troubleshooting
Extra info about the admin-GUI
Character limitations
Code signing
Introduction
Information how to install EJBCA can be found in the Installation guide.
This Administrator Guide is a reference guide to the concepts, configurations and options available in EJBCA. The guide is targeted for
administrators who are responsible for installing, configuring and maintaining EJBCA installations. More detailed hands on instructions
for various day to day administrative tasks can be found in the User Guide.
This guide covers detailed information about using various protocols, hardware security modules etc of EJBCA. These details covers
both configuration and usage.
Concepts
Before using this guide you should be familiar with the various concepts, such as certificate and end entity profiles, used in EJBCA.
There is a separate document explaining the different concepts.
When exporting profiles (bin/ejbca.sh ca exportprofiles), all profiles will be exported to the specified directory. The exported files will
be given unique names containing profile name and profile id. When importing profiles the profile name and id will be read from the
filename. All profiles present in the specified directory will be imported.
Fixed profiles will not be exported or imported. If a profiles with the same name as the one being imported already exist, the profiles
will not be imported. References to publishers with unknown id will be dropped.
Import of profiles try to keep the same profile id. If it already exist a profile with the same id in the database, it will try to choose
another and change any (end entity profile to certificate profile) reference during later imports. The reason the id is kept is that there
are references to the profile id from users belonging to the profile.
During import on a new EJBCA instance where CAs that are referenced from the profiles don't exist, a default CA has to be specified
on command line. Two CAs are concidered identical in this context if they have the same subject DN.
Managing CA s
Under certain circumstances, it can be wise to backup the CA's signature and encryption keys. Remember to protect the backup in
the same way as the CA itself.
Soft token CAs can be exported and backed up. CAs with the keys on a HSM can naturally not be exported through EJBCA. Use the
HSMs methods to back up such keys.
Soft token CAs can be imported using both the CLI and admin-GUI, while HSM CAs can only be imported using the CLI.
*** Using command line interface ***
To export a CA named "TestCA" to the PKCS#12-file "/path/TestCA.p12" with password "foo123" enter the following from the
$EJBCA_HOME directory:
To import the backup keys for "TestCA" later, enter the following from the $EJBCA_HOME directory:
To be able to export and import the CA's keys using the admin-GUI, you have to have superadministrator access. Make sure
that .p12 files are not automatically saved to an unsuitable place by your browser. before you do an export.
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Soft token CAs can have their keystore removed from the database. When the keystore is removed the CA can not issue
certificates and its CA token status is set to 'offline'.
Warning: Before removing the keystore make sure you have exported it if you would like to be able to restore it later. See the
section 'Export and import CAs'
To remove the catoken keys for "TestCA", enter the following from the $EJBCA_HOME directory:
To restore the catoken keys again for "TestCA" with the keystore exported as "TestCA-exported.p12", enter the following from the
$EJBCA_HOME directory:
Renew CAs
To renew only the CA certificate using the same keys you simply press the button "Renew CA". Your CA have to be on-line for this
to work, so it can sign the new certificate if it's a self signed CA or the certificate request if it is a sub CA. Also if it is a subCA with
the rootCA in the same EJBCA instance the root CA must also be on-line.
To renew the CA keys you check the box "Renew keys" and give the CA token authentication code. After this you simply press
"Renew CA".
Renewing the keys will not always work if you are using an HSM. It may work with some HSMs and not work with others.
You can report success and failures to us.
When using an HSM you can also make the renewal of keys manually. Simply generate new keys on the HSM with whatever tools
you used the first time (preferably the EJBCA cli tools), and then edit the CA token properties to use the new key. After the new
key has been configured you can simply press "Renew CA" (without the renew keys checkbox), to generate your new CA
certificate.
Revoke CAs
If you want to revoke a CA you can do so by going to "Edit Certificate Authorities" in the admin GUI. There is a button "Revoke
CA".
If you revoke a Root CA it will revoke all certificates in the database issued by the root CA, and create a CRL.
If you revoke a Sub CA it will revoke all certificates in the database issued by the sub CA, and to the sub CA, and create a
CRL. This works automatically if the sub CA and root CA is handled by the same EJBCA instance. If the Sub CA is signed by
an external CA, the sub CA's certificate must be revoked by the external CA.
If you revoke an external CA /sub CA to a CA in EJBCA) the external CAs certificate will be revoked and put on the CRL of
the issuing CA in EJBCA.
Import users
Users from another CA can be imported with the CLI command:
bin/ejbca.sh ca importcert
You have to give several parameters to the command. Running the command without parameters will print instructions.
CRL generation
A new CA should always issue an (empty) CRL. This is done when the ca is created and can also be done by running 'ca.sh/cmd
createcrl caname'.
See also the User Guide for details how to configure CRL periods, CRL Distribution Points and CRL Issuers.
There are at least two ways to have EJBCA to periodically create updated CRLs.
From EJBCA 3.4 there is a timed service framework in EJBCA. In the Admin-GUI you can go to 'Edit Services' and add a new
service. Edit the service and select the 'CRL Updater' worker and the interval you want to use. Don't forget to set the service to
'Active'.
Now this service will run with the interval you have configured and generate CRLs according to the settings for each CA.
Cron job
Yet another way to generate CRLs way is to have a cron job or equivalent call 'bin/ejbca.sh ca createcrl'. The 'createcrl' command
will then check all active CAs if it is a need to update their CRLs, otherwise nothing is done.
If you want to force CRL generation for a CA, use 'bin/ejbca.sh ca createcrl caname'
PATH=$PATH:/usr/java/jdk1.6.0_01/bin
@daily cd /home/ejbca;/home/ejbca/bin/ejbca.sh ca createcrl;
where '/usr/java/jdk1.4.2_01/bin' is the path to where 'java' can be found. '/home/ejbca' is where ejbca is installed and 'ca.sh'
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located.
SHELL=/bin/sh
PATH=/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin
CLASSPATH=$CLASSPATH:/root/ejbca
APPSRV_HOME=/usr/local/jboss
# m h dom mon dow command
00 0 * * * cd /root/ejbca;./bin/ejbca.sh ca createcrl
Delta CRLs
EJBCA can issue delta CRLs. In the CA configuration, set 'Delta CRL Period' to the amount of time your delta CRLs will be valid if
delta CRLs are issued. Command line interface and CRL Update service will generate delta CRLs if 'Delta CRL Period' is larger than
0.
Scep
Since SCEP uses encryption, you must install the 'Unlimited Strength Jurisdiction Policy Files' for JDK. The policy files can be found at
the same place as the JDK download. Further information on this can be found in the Sun documentation on the JCE.
There are some compatibility issues with SCEP, one being if the CA certificate should be returned in a SCEP enrollment response or
not. The CA certificate is optional but some, Cisco VPN client, seems to require it while others, Juniper, seems to dislike it. Therefore
EJBCA has two SCEP URLs.
http://localhost:8080/ejbca/publicweb/apply/scep/pkiclient.exe
http://localhost:8080/ejbca/publicweb/apply/scep/noca/pkiclient.exe
EJBCA implements features from (at least) draft 11 of the SCEP spec. This means that we implement the following SCEP
messages:
PKCSReq
GetCRL
GetCACert
GetCACertChain
GetCACaps
Using the External RA API the following SCEP message is also supported for polling mode:
GetCertInitial
POSTPKIOperation
SHA-1
*** CA mode ***
EJBCA does successfully receive SCEP 'PKCSReq' requests and send back the certifificate/CRL immediately in a proper SCEP
reply message. EJBCA (standard) does not support the 'polling' model, EJBCA uses the direct CA method, where a request is
granted or denied immediately. The SCEP client will send messages directly to the CA, encrypted with the CAs certificate.
The CN part of the DN in the PKCS#10 request, which is part of the Scep request, will be used as the 'username' when
authenticating the request in EJBCA. Create the Scep request with a CN mathing the username registered in EJBCA. The
challengePassword in the PKCS#10 request, which is part of the Scep request, will be used as the 'password' when
authenticating the request in EJBCA. Create the Scep request with a challengePassword mathing the password registered in
EJBCA.
The most common errors should be wrong username/password or wrong status (not NEW) on the user in EJBCA.
*** RA mode (ExtRA API 3.4.2) ***
EJBCA supports the SCEP 'polling' RA model using the External RA API. Using this a SCEP client can send a request to the
External RA, and then wait, polling the RA for updates. When the request is processed by the CA, which fetches the pkcs10
request from the External RA, the certificate is sent back to the External RA. When the certificate is complete on the External
RA, the RA sends back the SCEP certificate response the next time the SCEP client polls the RA. This feature is very useful to
securely insulate the CA from the SCEP clients throughout the network.
EJBCA will not send back proper SCEP error messages in all cases of failure. The error messages are not completely implemented,
although most of them are implemented.
Tested devices
OpenScep has does not work with modern OpenSSL implementation (only works with OpenSSL 0.9.6) and also has a bug that
causes it to crash when receiving SCEP responses. There are patches that address these issues though so it can be used.
To use the OpenScep client to request a certificate from this servlet, use the command:
openssl req -key test.key -new -days 30 -out test.req -outform DER -config ../openssl/openscep.cnf
openssl req -key test.key -new -days 30 -out test.pemreq -outform PEM -config ../openssl/openscep.cnf
Simple Scep Client. You should only use CN in the users DN (same as for PIX below).
*** jSCEP ***
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To enroll using the Juniper box go to the Web GUI at https://<juniper-ip>/, then click your way to Objects->Certificates. To
create a new certificate request:
When using Cryptlib, the CA certificate must have KeyUsage 'Key Encipherment' in addition to the usual key usage flags. This
is reasonable, since SCEP requires the CA to actually encrypt data (which generally is a bad thing, since a special encryption
certificate should be used for that).
Key usage for a ScepCA should be: Certificate Sign, CRL Sign, Digital Signature, Key Encipherment
Use the complete path as for the Cisco VPN client below as server name.
*** Cisco VPN client ***
CA URL='http://127.0.0.1:8080/ejbca/publicweb/apply/scep/pkiclient.exe'
CA Domain=you CAs name in EJBCA
In the DN screen simply enter the username (as added in EJBCA) as 'Name [CN]'
When using an External RA to enroll with the Cisco VPN client, the RA certificate must have KeyUsage SigitalSignature and
KeyEncipherment for the client to accept the CA certificates. However, to locate the RA encryption certificate, only
KeyEncipherment can be set, which makes things quite complicated.
The conclusion is that RA enrollment does not work with Cisco VPN client.
*** AutoSscep ***
EJBCA has been tested successfully with AutoSscep for enrollment against the CA and the External RA SCEP service.
Instructions:
CADir="/home/autosscep/"
CertDir="/home/autosscep/"
KeyDir="/home/autosscep/"
[CA]
DN="C=SE, O=EJBCA Sample, CN=AdminCA1"
URL="http://localhost:8080/ejbca/publicweb/apply/scep/pkiclient.exe"
CertFile="AdminCA1.cacert.pem"
EncCertFile="AdminCA1.cacert.pem"
[/CA]
[Certificate]
CertFile="mycert"
KeyFile="mykey"
CADN="C=SE, O=EJBCA Sample, CN=AdminCA1"
ChallengePassword="foo123"
[/Certificate]
AutoSscep also handles enrolling against an RA, where the RA first sends a PENDING response which the request is beeing
processed. After processing (by the CA) you simply run the AutoSscep client again to pick up the generated certificate.
In order to enroll against the External RA SCEP Server in EJBCA i only had to change the CA part of the configuration file to
use the SCEP RA servers certificate for signing and encrypting the messages instead of the CAs, and to use the URL to the RA.
The SCEP RA certificate is the end entity certificate issued to the External RA SCEP server (the keystore is usually called
scepraserver.p12).
[CA]
DN="C=SE, O=EJBCA Sample, CN=AdminCA1"
URL="http://localhost:8080/scepraserver/scep/pkiclient.exe"
CertFile="scepra.pem"
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EncCertFile="scepra.pem"
[/CA]
You must configure JBoss to use port 80 to enroll with PIX, this is done in APPSRV_HOME/server/default/deploy
/jbossweb-tomcat50.sar/service.xml (or similar depending on version). You must run as root to use port 80.
EJBCA supports the 'ca' mode of enrollment for pix, not 'ra'. For 'ra' and polling enrollment you can use the External RA
module (extra).
The certificate profile used by the SCEP CA must include the key usages KeyEncipherment and DataEncipherment,
otherwise PIX will not be able to verify/decrypt encrypted SCEP messages. This is not in the default certificate profile for
CAs. Create a new certificate profile before creating the Scep CA, you can use ROOTCA as template for the new
certificate profile.
When enrolling for certificate using SCEP with for example a Cisco PIX it is a 'ca_nickname'. This nickname should be the
CA-name as defined when creating the CA in EJBCA. For example 'vpnca'.
Only use lower-case names when creating the CA in EJBCA, since PIX will change the CA name VpnCA to vpnca when
enrolling.
The username in EJBCA must be the name the PIX identifies itself with name.domain, example pix.primekey.se.
The end-entity DN must include the DN components CN and unstructuredName, ex "CN=pix.primekey.se,
unstructuredName=pix.primekey.se". You can also include O, C etc in the certificate. A normal DN for a PIX is
"CN=pix.primekey.se,unstructuredName=pix.primekey.se,O=PrimeKey,C=SE".
Certificates used for PIX MUST include the DN component unstructuredName (fqdn) and could also include
unstructuredAddress (ip) being the IP-address of the PIX.
The certificate used on the Cisco PIX MUST have a SubjectAltName field dNSName, matching the DN component
unstructuredName. This is needed in order for Cisco VPN clients to connect to the PIX. The DNS Name field is not
necessary for the PIX to enroll perfectly with EJBCA, only for the client to be able to connect.
Certificates used for PIX may also use the SubjectAltName iPAddress matching the DN component unstructuredAddress,
but it's not necessary.
Cisco does not support use of the 'Domain Component', DC, attribute in DNs, don't use it.
KeyUsage should include Digital Signature and Key Encipherment, the EJBCA defaults work fine.
When the Cisco VPN-client (above) connects to the PIX, the 'ou' part of the clients DN must match a Vpngroup you have
specified, otherwise the connection will fail.
Cisco PIX needs the SCEP response messages to use MD5 as hash algorithm, not SHA1, this is handled by EJBCA
automatically.
Be sure that the PIX Firewall clock is set to GMT, month, day, and year before configuring CA. Otherwise, the CA may reject or
allow certificates based on an incorrect timestamp. Cisco's PKI protocol uses the clock to make sure that a CRL is not expired.
Set timezone first, then set time, then check time with 'show clock'.
CA Certificate
Status: Available
Certificate Serial Number: 7c7cf75236955a51
Key Usage: General Purpose
C = SE
O = PrimeKey
CN = pixca
Validity Date:
start date: 15:59:20 GMT Sep 16 2005
end date: 16:09:20 GMT Sep 14 2015
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From EJBCA 3.5, CMP support in RA mode (see below) can support several CAs and profiles based on the keyId of the password used
to protect the CMP messages (PBE protection).
In EJBCA 3.4 CMP support in RA mode is currently limited to one keyId, making RA requests for one CA.
Configuration
Copy conf/cmp.properties.sample to conf/cmp.properties and configure. The options in the configuration file should be documented
there.
By default EJBCA support CMP over the http transport protocol. The URL for the CMP servlet is:
http://127.0.0.1:8080/ejbca/publicweb/cmp
You can enable a CMP TCP service by changing the option 'cmp.tcp.enabled' in conf/cmp.properties. The service MBean is so far
JBoss specific (at least the deployment of it).
When re-deploying EJBCA this will start a TCP listener on the default port for CMP over TCP. You must run JBoss as root to use the
default port, since it is a low port (<1024). See the documentation in conf/cmp.properties for information about configuration
options for TCP. We recommend using a non standard port > 1024.
User authentication
Initialization and certification requests uses the CRMF request message (RFC4211). There messages are interesting as there are a
zillion options how to authenticate them. EJBCA currently does authentication through the means of a regToken control
(id-regCtrl-regToken) in the CRMF message. The regToken is a UTF8String which is the users password as registered in EJBCA.
Users can be looked up from the request in different ways, as configured in conf/cmp.properties. By default the subject DN from
the certTemplate in the request is used to look up the used in EJBCA. You can also configure EJBCA to use the CN or the UID from
the subject DN as the username in EJBCA.
Proof of possession
Proof of Possession (POP) is another part where CMP has gazillions of different options.
The following POPs in the CRMF are supported by EJBCA:
raVerify - if configured so in conf/ejbca.properties EJBCA will support the raVerify POP and in that case not do any
verification of POP. By default this is false, because the standard does not recommend this option.
signature - where the PublicKey is in the CertTemplate and the signature is calculated over the CertReqMsg.certReq (the
standard procedure when the CertTemplate contains the subject and publicKey values).
Currently these are the only POPs supported by EJBCA, so if you don't use raVerify or signature your request will fail because POP
is not verified.
Normal or RA mode for CMP
Normal mode works like any other enrollment in EJBCA. When a request comes in EJBCA verifies the request (see User
authentication above) and issues a certificate to a user that has been previously registered in EJBCA.
This is the default mode of operation.
*** RA ***
RA mode is used when the CMP client will act as an RA to EJBCA. When the RA sends a certificate request to EJBCA, no user is
pre-registered in EJBCA. When EJBCA receives the request, the message will be authenticated using PasswordBasedMAc, as
defined in the CMP spec, using a pre-shared password. When the message has been authenticated, a user is created in EJBCA
and a certificate is issued.
The users DN is taken from the CertTemplate in the request message send from the RA (i.e. the DN requested by the
RA).
The username in EJBCA is generated according to the options set in conf/cmp.properties.
The password for the user in EJBCA is random.
If the Certificate Profile allows it, keyUsage and validity is also taken from the CertTemplate in the request message.
After the user has been created in EJBCA, a certificate is generated as usual and sent back to the RA, who will distribute it to
the end-user.
If the same username is constructed (for example UID) as an already existing user, the existing user will be modified with new
values for profile etc, and a new certificate will be issued for that user.
To allow requests with different KeyId to be mapped to different CAs and profiles in EJBCA, so the documentation for the
options in conf/cmp.properties.sample.
*** Sample config ***
A sample config of EJBCA to allow an RA to request certificates for users. The RA uses password based mac (pbe) protection of
CMP messages with password 'password'. Users will be created using UID from the request DN and with a prefix, so the
resulting username will be: cmp<UsersUID>. End entity profiles names CMP_ENTITY and CMP_CERT is created in EJBCA
allowing the request DN.
cmp.operationmode=ra
cmp.allowraverifypopo=true
cmp.responseprotection=pbe
cmp.ra.authenticationsecret=password
cmp.ra.namegenerationscheme=DN
cmp.ra.namegenerationparameters=UID
cmp.ra.namegenerationprefix=cmp
#cmp.ra.namegenerationpostfix=
cmp.ra.endentityprofile=CMP_ENTITY
cmp.ra.certificateprofile=CMP_CERT
cmp.ra.caname=AdminCA1
Certificate validity
Normally the validity period of issued certificates are controlled by the certificate profile. If you enable 'Allow validity override' in
the certificate profile, and the CMP initialization- or certification request contains a validity time in the CRMF request template,
this validity period will be used.
Normally the key usage extension of issued certificates are controlled by the certificate profile. If you enable 'Allow Key Usage
Override' in the certificate profile, and the CMP initialization- or certification request contains a key usage in the CRMF request
template, this key usage will be used.
Interoperability
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CMP has been tested using RSA jCert toolkit for initialization requests. To run this as an RA you should configure CMP with:
cmp.operationmode=ra
cmp.allowraverifypopo=true
cmp.responseprotection=pbe
cmp.ra.authenticationsecret=your shared password
and other configurations you want for your RA.
CMP has been tested with BlueX from AET Europe (http://www.aeteurope.nl/). From EJBCA's point of view BlueX functions as an
RA with the same configuration options as for jCert.
CMP Proxy
In some installations it may be desirable to terminate the client connection in a DMZ before connecting further to the CA. In this
case the client never has a direct network connection to the CA machine. In such a scenario you can use the CMP proxy module.
Clients use the CMP proxy, as it would otherwise use EJBCA. The proxy in turn connects to EJBCA gets the answer and forwards it
back to the client.
The proxy is a stand alone module that runs on another mahing than the CA itself.
See '${EJBCA_HOME}/modules/cmpProxy/resources/README' for information how to build and use the proxy.
Ocsp
Note! Some OCSP clients does not handle external OCSP responders very well unfortunately. You should be aware of this.
OCSP is used by PKI-clients to verify the validity of certificates in real-time. This is done by sending a request for the status of a
specific certificate to an OCSP responder. The responder may or may not be the same as the CA. The OCSP responder sends a signed
reply, containing the requested status information back to the client. The client uses this status information to determine whether the
certificate is valid for use or revoked.
It is an OCSP servlet receiving requests on http://localhost:8080/ejbca/publicweb/status/ocsp. The servlet can process requests for
certificates signed by a CA running in EJBCA, as long as the CAs OCSP service has not been deactivated.
The OCSP servlet receives OCSP request by http(s) and send back a status response signed by the CA, or with a dedicated responder
certificate.
For a CA to be valid as an OCSP-responder it must have the KeyUsage 'Digital Signature' in the certificate profile used to create the
CA. This KeyUsage must be included if the CA is to sign OCSP-responses. The default certificate profiles for CAs includes the key
usage 'Digital Signature'.
There are a two parameters affecting the OCSP service that can be configured in conf/ejbca.properties:
'useCASigningCert' - If set to true (default) the OCSP responses will be signed directly by the CAs certificate instead of the CAs
OCSP responder. If set to false, the CAs special OCSP responder certificate is used to sign the OCSP responses. The OCSP
responder certificate is signed directly by the CA.
'defaultResponderID' - Specifies the subject of a CA which will generate responses when no real CA can be found from the
request. This is used to generate 'unknown' responses when a request is received for a certificate that is not signed by any CA
on this server. Set this to the same DN as your initial Admin CA for example.
These values should be set during deployment of EJBCA. After the values have been edited, they are installed with the 'ant deploy'
command.
Example to generate an OCSP request using OpenSSL (works with both internal and external OCSP responders):
openssl ocsp -issuer Test-CA.pem -CAfile Test-CA.pem -cert Test.pem -req_text -url http://localhost:8080/ejbca/publicweb/stat
1. 'Use OCSP to validate all certificates using this URL and signer' in 'Privacy & Security->Validation'. Choose the CA from EJBCA
(which you should have made Trusted by right clicking in 'Privacy & Security->Certificates->Manage Certificates->Authorities'
and checking the appropriate checkboxes).
2. If using a Certificate Profile that includes a OCSP Service URL for client certificates, the Validation option in Firefox 'Use OCSP
to validate only certificates that specify an OCSP service URL' also works fine. When this option is checked you may need to
restart Mozilla.
When the validation settings are set, Firefox will query the OCSP server when for example double-clicking on a certificate in the
certificate manager. An appropriate URL for validation is: http://hostname:8080/ejbca/publicweb/status/ocsp
If using a dedicated OCSP responder certificate, this certificate must probably not be imported in Firefox as a Trusted CA certificate.
But if you want to, you can do this through 'View Certificates' in EJBCA (http://hostname:8080/ejbca/retrieve/ca_certs.jsp).
In doc/samples it is a sample how to check revocation with OCSP using the new APIs in JDK 1.5.
You can set up separated OCSP responders in EJBCA. Using this you can isolate the CA from the Internet and still be able to
answer OCSP request. You can set up firewalls so that only outgoing traffic is allowed from the CA, and nothing to the CA.
Separated OCSP responders is also good when you don't require high-performance clustering for the CA, but you do need
high-performance for the OCSP responders. This should be a usual setup, if the CA only issues certificates once every year for one
million users, this does not put much pressure on the CA, but the OCSP responders can be put under high load continuously.
See the OCSP Installation document for information how to set up stand-alone, separated OCSP responders.
To try out and test your OCSP installation you can use the EJBCA client toolbox, (see below). The toolbox has replaced the old
ocsp client which has been removed. You can also use the API directly from your java program.
A good example of using OCSP is to check digitally signed PDF documents using Adobe Reader.
To be able to verify certificates in Adobe Reader, you must first add the CA-certificate as trusted in Adobe Reader. You can do that
in the menu Document->Trusted Identities. Choose Certificates in the drop-down list and click 'Add contacts', now you can browse
to the CA-certificate that you have downloaded in DER format (for example by choosing download to IE on the public EJBCA
pages). The CA-certificate must have been saved with a name ending with '.cer'. After adding the new contact, you have to click
'Edit trust' and check at least 'Signatures and as trusted root' and 'Certified documents'. This works the same using both internal
and external OCSP responders.
Certificates that have an 'OCSP service locator' will be verified against the OCSP responder. You can configure this in the
certificate profile used to issue certificates.
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HTTPS.
The functionality currently available through the Web Service Interface are documented in the EJBCA Web Service API Reference.
There is also a cli tool that can be used for remote scripting. See following section for more information. Note: All these calls are not
available through the CLI.
the Web Services interface requries client certificate authentication from administrators, in the same way as the admin GUI does.
If you have a client certificate the works on the admin GUI you should also be able to use it for the web service interface.
Configuration for the Web Services CLI requires a JKS keystore. You can easily generate a JKS for an administrator using the
admin GUI (you can even create a JKS for superadmin). Below is a short description how to create a JKS for a user on the
command line, and adding the new user to the superadministrator admin group.
There exists one propertyfile in conf/jaxws.properties.sample that is used to configure the behaviour of the WS service. To
configure it copy it and name it jaxws.properties.
See the sample file for details of how to configure the Web Service interface.
If the end entity profile informations must be used to define default values when you create a user, the flag "Allow merge DN
Webservices" must be checked in the end entity profile.
If multiple instances of a component exist, the merge is done from end to begin, and the remaining values of this component type
will be placed at the end. For example, if you want to merge : dn=cn=foo,..., dc=dc1, ..., dc=dc2, ... with dn=..., dc=mdc1,
..., dc=mdc2, ..., dc=mdc3, ... the result will be : dn=cn=foo, ..., dc=mdc1, ..., dc=mdc2, ..., dc=mdc3, ...
Included in the EJBCA Client Tool Box is a Web Service CLI tool.
To use the client do the following, copy the directory with all included files to the computer you want to remote administrate from.
Then create a JKS or P12 file with the appropriate access rights (See the Using API section for details) and finally configure the
file ejbcawsracli.properties. In this file you should specify the hostname of the CA server, the name of the keystore and the
password to unlock it. Documentation for each setting is in the file ejbcacsracli.properties.
Use 'ejbcaClientToolBox.sh EjbcaWsRaCli' for a list of each subcommand and 'ejbcaClientToolBox.sh EjbcaWsRaCli "subcommand"'
for detailed help how to use the cli.
Example usage: ejbcaClientToolBox.sh EjbcaWsRaCli pkcs12req testuser2 foo123 2048 NONE tmp
You can use the Web Service interface to integrate EJBCA from other applications.
If you are using another language than Java you should start by downloading the WSDL file at http://hostname:8080/ejbca
/ejbcaws/ejbcaws?wsdl
When using java you can find the required libs in 'dist/ejbcawscli' and it's 'lib' subdirectory.
CertTools.installBCProvider();
String urlstr = "https://localhost:8443/ejbca/ejbcaws/ejbcaws?wsdl";
System.setProperty("javax.net.ssl.trustStore","p12/wstest.jks");
System.setProperty("javax.net.ssl.trustStorePassword","foo123");
System.setProperty("javax.net.ssl.keyStore","p12/wstest.jks");
System.setProperty("javax.net.ssl.keyStorePassword","foo123");
Example call to find all users having 'Vendil' in their subject dn:
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Sample code
See the file modules/ejbca-ws/src/org/ejbca/core/protocol/ws/common/IEjbcaWS for more detailed instructions of the API. Sample
code can be taken from:
All the calls requires HTTPS client authentication. The keystore used must be set up as a regular administrator and access rules
according to the following:
Common for all calls (except isAuthorized, existsHardToken, isApproved that only needs a valid trusted certificate):
/administrator
/ca/'related CA'
editUser:
findUser, findCert:
/ra_functionality/view_end_entity
/ra_functionality/'end entity profile of the user'/view_end_entity
pkcs10Request, pkcs12req:
/ra_functionality/view_end_entity
/ra_functionality/'end entity profile of the user'/view_end_entity
/ca_functionality/create_certificate
certificateRequest, softTokenRequest:
/ra_functionality/revoke_end_entity
/ra_functionality/'end entity profile of the user owning the cert'/revoke_end_entity
/ra_functionality/revoke_end_entity
/ra_functionality/'end entity profile of the user'/revoke_end_entity
/ra_functionality/delete_end_entity (only if users should be deleted)
/ra_functionality/'end entity profile of the user'/delete_end_entity (only if users should be deleted)
genTokenCertificate: Important this call also supports approvals, and the default behaviour is when someone without the
'/administrator' access is creating a call then will a GenerateTokenApprovalRequest be created. This behaviour can be turned off in
the jaxws.properties file.
getHardTokenData: Important this call also supports approvals, and the default behaviour is when someone without the
'/administrator' access is creating a call then will a ViewHardTokenApprovalRequest be created. This behaviour can be turned off in
the jaxws.properties file.
/ra_functionality/view_hardtoken
/endentityprofilesrules/'end entity profile of user'/view_hardtoken
/endentityprofilesrules/'end entity profile of user'/view_hardtoken/puk_data (if viewPUKData = true)
getHardTokenDatas:
/ra_functionality/view_hardtoken
/endentityprofilesrules/'end entity profile of user'/view_hardtoken
/endentityprofilesrules/'end entity profile of user'/view_hardtoken/puk_data (if viewPUKData = true)
republishCertificate:
/ra_functionality/view_end_entity
/endentityprofilesrules/'end entity profile of the user'/view_end_entity
/endentityprofilesrules/'end entity profile of user'/view_hardtoken/puk_data (if viewPUKData = true)
deleteUserDataFromSource:
/userdatasourcesrules/'user data source'/remove_userdata (for all the given user data sources)
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/ca_functionality/view_certificate
caCertResponse, caRenewCertRequest:
/ca_functionality/renew_ca
Business error code have been added in order to discriminate exception of type EjbcaException.
try {
ejbcaraws.editUser(user1);
} catch(EjbcaException_Exception e) {
if(org.ejbca.core.ErrorCode.CERT_PROFILE_NOT_EXISTS.getInternalErrorCode().equals(e.getFaultInfo().getErrorCode().get
log.error("No such certifcate profile.");
}
}
You can also take a look at src/test/org/ejbca/core/protocol/ws/CommonEjbcaWSTest.java to see how the error code can be used.
WS transaction logging
The logging is done the same way as the logging for the OCSP responder is done. See OCSP Audit and Account Logging. But
different tags are used:
XKMS Service
Introduction
From EJBCA 3.4 the XKMS protocol is supported as a service as a complement to the EJBCA Web Service interface.
It's disabled in the standard installation (from EJBCA 3.10) and have the Web Service URL http://"hostname":8080/ejbca
/xkms/xkms
NOTE: XKMS only works well with JDK 1.5, it does not work with JDK 6.
The XKMS service is configured in the file conf/xkms.properties, just edit the file before building the application.
Important, if signing of responses is needed, must the XKMS CA service for the configured CA be activated in the 'Edit CA' page.
The XKMS Signer have it's own certificate for each CA just as the OCSP service and is created during the installation or upgrade of
a CA.
Currently are the methods locate, validate, register, reissue, revoke and recover). The Compond request isn't implemented.
The XKMS Service only supports synchronized calls, not asynchronized or two-phase requests.
The register listener expects a UseKeyWith=urn:ietf:rfc:2459 (PKIX) with the subjectDN as identifier and is mapped to the
user. The password of the user Must be marked as cleartext in order for KRSS to work. In KeyInfo is one RSAKeyInfo required
if the user have the type 'USERGENERATED'. All other UseKeyWith or KeyUsage is ignored. since it is the register userdata
that is used when issuing the certificate. If the user have the type "P12" in it's userdata then will a server generated key be
inserted in a PrivateKey in the response. It is the same password to encrypt the key as for the enrollment. RespondWith
RSAPublicKey, X509Certificate, X509CertificateChain and PrivateKey is supported.
The reissue listener expects one X509Certificate KeyInfo in the request and the subjectDN and public is extracted and used for
the new certificate. Revoked certificates cannot be renewed. The generated key will be inserted in a PrivateKey in the
response. It is the same password to encrypt the key as for the enrollment. RespondWith RSAPublicKey, X509Certificate and
X509CertificateChain.
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The recover listener expects one X509Certificate KeyInfo in the request and is used to select the user in the database. Before
a key can be recovered the key have to be marked for recovery and a password set for the user in the usual way.
RespondWith RSAPublicKey, X509Certificate, X509CertificateChain and PrivateKey is supported.
The revoke listener expects one X509Certificate KeyInfo in the request and is used to select the certificate that should be
revoked. A revokation code is required, authentication tag is not supported. RespondWith RSAPublicKey, X509Certificate and
X509CertificateChain is supported.
*** XKMS Mappings ***
The RespondWith tag supports X509Certificate, X509CertificateChain, X509CRL, KeyName, KeyValue (and PrivateKey for
register and recover).
The QueryKeyBinding The query of a QueryKeyBinding is performed in the following way: If KeyInfo is included, the certificate
is extracted and the is used for checking the key usage and validity of the certificate If UseKeyWith is included (and no
KeyInfo) is the user database queried using the UseKeyWith mappings (if several UseKeyWith are the queried with an 'AND'
operator. Then are all certificates that fulfills all the KeyUsage mappings returned.
KeyUsage Mappings, The key usage constants is mapped against the following X509 key usages
UseKeyWith Mappings, All queries find their data using beginwith (except PKIX) of the identifier.
When building EJBCA, a XKMS CLI tool is also generated. The tool is placed in the directory dist/ejbca-xkms-cli and consists of the
all the necessary files needed to run the cli.
To use the client do the following, copy the directory with all included files to the computer you want to remote administrate from.
(Optionally create a JKS keystore from one XKMS Service trusted CAs) and configure the file xkmscli.properties. In this file you
should specify the hostname of the CA server, the name of the JKS keystore, the alias and the password to unlock it.
Use 'xkmscli.sh/cmd' for a list of each subcommand and 'xkms.sh/cmd "subcommand"' for detailed help how to use the cli.
1. Start with a fresh installation with all the default values. Then activate the XKMS CA service in the Edit CA page for AdminCA1.
External RA A PI
Information on how to use the External RA API is available here.
Key recovery
Key Recovery can be used to re-use or restore a users private key. To enable key recovery use the admin-GUI:
The following is an example of a sequence of commands that can be used to generate a new certificate for a user using the same key
pair:
bin/ejbca.sh batch
Admin GUI - List/Edit End Entities - View_Certificates for user - Revoke the certificate with revocation reason
Admin GUI - List/Edit End Entities - View_Certificates for user - Recover Key, Close
Admin GUI - List/Edit End Entities - Edit_End_Entity for user - Enter new password for user, Save
Public Web - Create Keystore - Enter username and password - Fetch the keystore
Technical details
What the operation "bin/ejbca.sh ra keyrecovernewest", or "recover key" in the admin GUI, or keyRecoverNewest in the WS API
actually does is that it marks the user/certificate for key recovery. This means that the next time you make a call to generate a
keystore (p12/jks/pem) for the user the CA will get the private key, held encrypted in the recovery database, and the existing
user certificate or a new certificate, and create a keystore for the user with this old key pair. The actual recovery would then
happen when you make a call to i.e. pkcs12Req in the WS API, or if keystore type is P12, JKS or PEM in the admin GUI.
Email notifications
Mail settings in JBoss is created when running the 'ant deploy' using the values specified in conf/mail.properties (or default).
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Email notification can be sent when status changes for an end entity, for example when a new user is added (status changes to
new).
1. You must create a new end-entity profile to be able to issue certificates to end users using email notifications. Under the RA
functions, choose "Edit End Entity Profiles" and add a new profile. Select the profile and go into 'Edit End Entity profile'. In
this page you can Enable Send Notifications and create the notification message. Make sure the checkbox 'Use Send
Notification' is checked.
2. Add a new end entity. You must select the new end entity profile you created above. Make sure the checkbox 'Send
Notification' is checked. Enter the from-address and subject. Enter a message using the variables defined for dynamic
substitution in the next section. Use ${NL} for newline in the mail message.
USER: send notification to the email registered for the end entity.
foo@bar.com: send notification to the specified email address. Multiple email addresses can be entered comma separated.
CUSTOM: plug-in mechanism to retrieve addresses your own way. See interface
org.ejbca.core.model.ra.raadmin.ICustomNotificationRecipient for implementation details. Enter a string like
"CUSTOM:org.ejbca.MyCustomPluginClass" to use.
You can also use substitution variable in the notification sender and recipient fields. See samples below.
The Notification Events specify which status changes for a user that will trigger a notification. The default values are suitable to
send an email to a user when he/she should go and pick up a certificate. You can also select for example STATUSGENERATED to
send email notifications to an administrator when the user picks up the certificate.
Tip: If you configure autogenerated password in end entity profile you don't need to enter one in the adduser page. A generated
one will automatically be sent with the email.
If you want to re-send a notification for a user, reset the status to NEW.
Parameters that can be used with different usages of email notification. All parameters isn't always set, it depends on the input
data.
Examples
In certain circumstances, e.g. when you need to comply with PCI or the lighter levels of FIPS-140/160, it may be required to
configure a 2 step issuance process. This can by done by using the notifications. Create 3 email notifications:
1. To: USER
Email notification to -just- the user with the URL to pick up the cert and the username. Make clear in the message that he
or she will be contacted by the approving admin with the password.
2. To: ${approvalAdmin.E}
Email notification to the apporiving admin with the password (but not the username) and a message which makes clear that
this password is to be passed to the user - by phone or f2f (but not by email).
3. To: ca-team@foo... **
Email notification of the issuing to the auditor mailing lists - without above username/password.
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This is configured in the end entity profiles by selecting a printer, the number of copies and uploading a SVG formatted template.
There exists a template in 'src/cli/svgTemplate/Batch PIN envelope print.svg' that can be used for testing.
For more information how to write EJBCA SVG templates see: http://wiki.ejbca.org/ (Administration->hardtokenprofiles).
In order to renew the list of available printers you must restart the http session since the list is cached for performance reasons.
A pproving A ctions
It is possible to have other administrators (1-5) to approve an action in order to make sure the correct data is entered.
In the main menu there is a new option 'Approve Actions' that lets the administrator to search for waiting requests and review its data
and finally gives his approval or reject the action.
Configuring Approvals
Approvals are configured for each CA, in the 'Edit Certificate Authorities' page and for each certificate profile in the 'Edit Certificate
Profiles' page. Just select the actions that needs approval and the number of approvers required and save. The actions 'Add End
Entity', 'Change End Entity' and 'Change User Status' are all covered by the setting 'Add/Edit End Entity'. 'Revoke End Entity', 'Revoke
Certificate', 'Revoke Token' and 'Reactivate Certificate' are covered by setting 'Revocation'. Approvals will be required if the CA or the
certificate profile enforces it and in case the number of approvers differs between the CA and the certificate profile the largest number
of approvers will be used.
Give an admin group the role of SuperAdmin, CAAdmin or RAAdmin with Approve End Entities selected.
The SuperAdmin and CAAdmin gives access to approve rules not associated with any end entity profile (I.e dual authenticated CA
configuration (Not implemented yet)) while the RAAdmin only can approve actions related to authorized end entity profiles.
'/cafunctionality/approve_caaction', a rule that gives access to non end entity profile related actions like approving CA editing
and creation (not implemented yet). An administrator must have either this rule or the '/rafunctionalty/approve_end_entity' in
order to access the 'Approve Actions' web pages.
'/rafunctionalty/approve_end_entity', a rule (along with the corresponding end entity profile rule) that gives access to end entity
profile related access rules, like adding and editing end entities. The administrator must also have the 'approve_end_entity rule'
for at least one of the '/endentityprofilerules/' in order to approve any actions.
'/endentityprofilerules/<endentityprofilename>/approve_end_entity'see previous rule.
In the system there are basically two different classes of requests. One is requests to do some action, like adding an end entity, and
that is executed directly after the last required administrator has approved the action. This type is called 'Executable Action Request'.
The other type are requests to get hold of some information, like hard token PUK codes or archived keys. This kind of request is
approved when the last administrator gives his consent and is valid for a defined period of time (in conf/ejbca.properties). In this case
is the requesting administrator supposed to poll the approval request if it has been approved or not. These requests are called
'Non-Executable Action Requests'.
Waiting: Means that the action request is waiting to be processed by authorized administrators, request are valid for the time
specified by approval.defaultrequestvalidity in conf/ejbca.properties before it is set to status Expired.
Approved: Means that the action request is approved and is valid for the amount of time specified by
approval.defaultapprovalvalidity in conf/ejbca.properties. After this it is set to Expired. Used by action requests that are not
executable.
Rejected: Means that the action request is rejected and won't be allowed. The rejection lasts the amount of time specified by
approval.defaultapprovalvalidity in conf/ejbca.properties. After this it is set to Expired and a new request can be done. Used by
action requests that are not executable.
Expired: Means that the action request isn't valid any more and cannot be processed. The requesting administrator has to make
a new request in order to approve it.
Expired and Notified: Same as 'Expired' but also indicates that the requesting administrator has been notified about that his
request have expired.
Executed: Means that the action request have been executed successfully. Used by action requests that are executable.
Execution Failed: Means that the action request failed for some reason during execution, see log for more information. Used by
action requests that are executable.
Execution Denied: Means that the action request hasn't been approved and will not be executed. The difference with status
'Rejected' is that this status is only used with executable requests and don?t have any expire time. This means that the
requesting administrator can apply again directly after the rejection.
Approval Notification
EJBCA approval functionality have been enhanced to sent notifications about approval requests.
To enable approval notification go to the system configuration page and check the 'Use Approval Notification' checkbox. You are also
required to set the email-address to the approving administrators. This should be a mail-alias to all administrators that should be able
to review approval requests and the from address that should be used when EJBCA sends emails.
Then whenever an approval request is created an e-mail is sent both to the requesting admin (if he has an e-mail configured in his
user data) and to the approval administrators.
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When the approving administrators have recieved the mail, there is a link directly to the approve request page where he can review
the requests. When he has approved and rejected the requested all the other administrators in notified about this.
The text of notifications is configured in src/intresources.xx.properties. See the ' Dynamic Substitution Variables' section in this
manual for a list of available variables.
Currently there exists a standalone framework for implementing custom user data sources in the same way as for custom publishers.
Later on will ready made LDAP and AD userdatasources be implemented to be used out of the box.
The first one is a set of CA ids that the userdatasource is applicable to. It can have a constant BaseUserDataSource.ANY_CA.
The second is a set of fields instructing the RA interface GUI which fields that should be modifyable by the RA and which that should
be fixed. Important, there is not connection between the user data source, isModifyable data and the end entity profile isModifyable
data. The userdata source is only an instruction to the RA gui then when the userdata is added will it be matched against the end
entity profile, and it's the data in the end entity profile that really counts.
Tip. The RA gui should read non-modifyable data twice since the RA could change the postdata even if the form have a field as
disabled.
Services Framework
EJBCA has a framework for timer services, i.e. procedures that should be run on a timely basis. Currently there exists five types of
services:
Configuration
The worker is the class that will be executed when the service runs. Each worker can have different worker specific
configuration.
*** Intervals ***
Periodical Interval
Mail Action
Action that sends an email notification when the service is executed and have the following settings:
The CRL Updater have the same functionality as the current JBoss Service and will in the future replace the old variant. I checks if
any of the CA:s need a new CRL and updates it if necessary. The worker have no settings and only supports the periodical interval
and no action.
The CRL update worker should never run simultaneously on two nodes, or simultaneously on one node. To avoid running more
than one instance on a single node there is a semaphore that inhibits more than one instance of the worker to run in a single
JVM. If a worker starts and another worker is already running the worker is rescheduled to run on the next planned interval, and
immediately terminated.
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To avoid running any two services on two nodes simultaneously, the service have a time stamp that is set when it runs, and
schedules the next run before the actual work is started. This time stamp makes it possible for another node to determine of the
service is already running on another node and not start running.
In practice what this leads to is that a service will always run on a single node, the same node every time.
A worker that checks if a CA have certificates about to expire and sends an email notification the the end user and/or
administrator. The worker have the following settings:
CAs to Check - Select here which CAs that should be searched for expiring certificates.
Time before notification is sent - The number of Days/Hours/Minutes/Seconds that should remain of the certificates validity
before the notification is sent.
Send notification to end user - Check this if a notification should be sent to the owner of the certificate. Observe that the
end user must have an email set in the user database (not necessarily in the certificate) in order for the service to send the
notification.
Notification Subject to End User - The e-mail subject.
End User Message - Message body of the notification. Here can the substitution variables be used defined in the 'Email
Notifications' section.
Send notification to Administrator - Check this if a notification should be sent to some defined administrator-mail address.
The address of the administrator is configured in the Mail Action component.
Notification Subject to Administrator - The e-mail subject.
Administrator Message - Message body of the notification. Here can the substitution variables be used defined in the 'Email
Notifications' section.
Note: you may configure multiple certificate expiration services set with different Time before notification is sent values in order to
further alert the user or administrator that a certificate is about to expire.
A worker that checks if a user has not enrolled for a new certificate within a specified amount of time after the user was last
edited. If the user has not enrolled within this time, the user's status is set to Generated and the user will not be able to enroll.
The worker have the same basic setting as the 'Certificate Expiration Check Service', except for 'Time before notification is sent'
which is replaced by:
Time until user password expire - The number of Days/Hours/Minutes/Seconds that a user should be able to enroll for a
certificate, i.e. the time before the user's password expire.
Renew CA Service
The renew CA service can be used to automatically renew CAs that are about to expire. This might be used for SubCAs that are
valid only short periods of time. The specific settings are:
CAs to Check - which CAs should be checked, and renewed if they are about to expire.
Time before CA expires to renew - the amount of time before the CA actually expires that the service should renew the CA.
For CAs using soft keystores and not using the default password, auto-activation is required.
Publisher Queue Process Service
The publisher queue process service processes the publisher queue. In the publisher queue, entries where publishing failed is
collected. This service will try to re-publish entries from this queue. The specific settings are:
Publishers to check - which publishers should this service check and re-publish for. You can run one service for each
publisher or one service for all publishers.
Note
If you run one service for each publisher you should onle configure one publisher in every service. Do not let two
services handle the same publisher.
To read on how the algorithm to prevent excessive database load etc is done, the easiest way is to read in the java file for class
PublishQueueProcessWorker.
The same algorithm as for the CRL update worker is used to make sure the service only runs in one instance on one node.
It is possible to write customized component plug-ins that can be used with other standard (or customized plug-ins) and this
section explains the steps necessary.
Common for all the components is that it is required to create a class implementing the components interface. Then you have to
create a jar containing the necessary plug-in classes and deploy it to application server so it is included in the class-path. The next
step is to create a service using the custom component by specifying the class path and optionally the custom properties used by
the component. The properties field have the same syntax as a regular Java property file.
CustomWorker
A Custom worker must implement the org.ejbca.core.model.services.IWorker interface. But a simpler way is to inherit the
BaseWorker class. Then you have to implement one method 'void work()' doing the actual work every time the service
framework decides it is time. The work method can make a call to the action (optional) component by
'getAction().performAction(someActionInfo);' The action info can vary depending on the action component but it must
implement the ActionInfo interface.
If something goes wrong during the work should a ServiceExecutionFailedException be thrown with a good error message.
CustomInterval
A Custom Interval must implement the org.ejbca.core.model.services.IInterval interface. But a simpler way is to inherit the
BaseInterval class. You then have to implement one method 'public long getTimeToExecution();' which should return the time
in seconds until the next time the service is run. Or it should return DONT_EXECUTE it the service should stop running.
CustomAction
A Custom Interval must implement the org.ejbca.core.model.services.IAction interface. But a simpler way is to inherit the
BaseAction class. Then should only one method be implemented 'performAction(ActionInfo actionInfo)' that should perform the
action according to the defined properties and the ActionInfo (all optional). If something goes wrong during the processing of
the action should a ActionException be thrown.
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When configuring a CA to use a HSM in the administration GUI it is a property field where properties unique to this very HSM is
specified. All implemented HSM modules are using the same property keywords to define the identity and the purpose of the keys to
be used. These keywords are:
certSignKey - the key to be used when signing certificates, can be RSA or ECDSA.
crlSignKey - the key to be used when signing CLSs, can be RSA or ECDSA.
keyEncryptKey - the key to be used for key encryption and decryption, this must be an RSA key.
testKey - the key to be used by HSM status checks, can be RSA or ECDSA.
hardTokenEncrypt - the key to be used for hardtoken encryption and decryption. PUK will be decrypted by this key.
defaultKey - the key to be used when no other key is defined for a purpose. If this is the only definition then this key will be
used for all purposes.
pin - optional pin code used for auto-activation of CA token, see below. Not recommended for high security set-ups, but very
useful in some cases.
You may omit defaultKey if you want to be sure that the right key is used, but then all the other keys must be specified. It's
recommended that the certificate and CRL signing keys are linked to the same key since different keys are rarely supported by
verifying applications.
When implementing support for a new HSM the 'KeyStrings' class could be used to manage the key properties described above. When
it is an JCA/JCE API for the HSM it could also be wise to extend the BaseCAToken class.
The same activation code must be used for all keys used by a CA.
There are four additional key properties that can (optionally) be used when renewing CA keys and to produce roll-over certificates..
previousCertSignKey - this is the alias of the previous signature key, as opposed to 'certSignKey' which is the current signature
key.
previousSequence - this is the sequence identifying the previous signature key, as opposed to the current sequence that is held
in the CA token. This sequence will replace the current sequence in the caRef field when signing a request with the CAs previous
key.
nextCertSigningKey - this is the alias of a new generated key on the HSM. When updating a CA signed by an external CA this is
used to send a request, but the CA is still active using the old key. When the certificate response is received this key is activate
and moved to certSignKey/crlSignKey.
nextSequence - this is the sequence identifying the next signature key.
Supported and tested HSMs are described below, with sample configurations and HSM specific documentation.
Since EJBCA 3.6 the recommended HSM connector is to use the PKCS#11 interface. Older jce implementations will gradually be
deprecated and removed.
PrimeKey Solutions is selling a module called PrimeCardHSM that implements a flexible HSM using low cost smart cards.
Auto-activation of CA tokens
The 'pin' property is used to be able to automatically activate a CA token. The activation code may be specified in the property
field with the keyword 'pin'. If this property is not specified then the CA has to be manually activated after each restart or
re-deployment of EJBCA.
Manual activation is done in the admin-GUI under 'Basic Functions->View Information', or using the cli 'bin/ejbca.sh ca
activateca'.
The 'pin' property can use a clear text password or an encrypted one.
(encrypted is only available in EJBCA >= 3.5):
pin foo123
pin 6bc841b2745e2c95e042a68b4777b34c
These two properties contains the same password. The encrypted pin value can be obtained with the command 'bin/ejbca.sh
encryptpwd':
NOTE: This encryption is not high security encryption, it is only meant to protect the password for accidental viewing. The
encryption uses a build in encryption key in EJBCA. With an encrypted pin you can for example bring up the 'Edit CAs' page in the
admin-GUI without everyone around immediately seeing your password.
If an attacker gets hold of the encrypted value it is easy to decrypt using the source code of EJBCA.
Support for DSA or ECDSA in HSMs are dependant on the support for the algorithms in the HSM manufacturers JCE provider. You
have to check if that support is available.
A PKCS#11 wrapper has been used to implement support for tokens with PKCS#11 libraries. The PKCS#11 provider have been
tested with Utimaco CryptoServer and nCipher nShield/netHSM and SafeNet ProtectServer and SafeNet Luna and AEP Keyper and
ARX CoSign and Bull TrustWay.
Besides the keys previously described the property field of the administration GUI should contain the following properties:
attributesFile - a file specifying PKCS#11 attributes (used mainly for key generation).
keyspec - key specification used when generating new HSM keys from within the admin GUI. Keyspec that is used as first
choice when generating new keys in the GUI of form "1024" for RSA keys, "DSA1024" for DSA keys and secp256r1 for EC
keys. If keyspec is not given EJBCA tries to generate a key with the same specification as the current cert signing key.
Attributes file is in the format specified in the "JavaTM PKCS#11 Reference Guide". See http://java.sun.com/javase/6/docs
/technotes/guides/security/p11guide.html and the examples further down in this file. An attributes file for nCipher typically looks
like this:
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attributes(generate,CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_PRIVATE = true
CKA_SIGN = true
CKA_DECRYPT = true
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
Note
If you are using an attributesFile and have more than one CA using the same slot it is very important that BOTH CA token
properties configurations contains the attributesFile. This is because the attributes are applied when the provider is installed
during startup. If one configuration does not have the attributesFile it can not be applied later on by the other configuration.
The tool "$EJBCA/clientToolBox-dist/ejbcaClientToolBox.sh PKCS11HSMKeyTool" is used administrate and generate keys. Use it
without parameters to get all valid options. Keys may be generated in two ways. Examples:
The first example uses the default attributes of the HSM and are then using specified slot and PKCS#11 library. The second uses a
configuration file. The contents of the file is specified in the PKCS#11 wrapper documentation from Sun. Often it is enough to use
the default but with some HSM it necessary to define some PKCS#11 attributes for the generated key.
hsmp11.conf looks for example like this for a SafeNet ProtectServer Gold:
name=SafeNet
library=/opt/PTK/lib/libcryptoki.so
slot=1
attributes(*,*,*) = {
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
attributes(*,CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_PRIVATE = true
CKA_SIGN = true
CKA_DECRYPT = true
CKA_EXTRACTABLE = true
CKA_SENSITIVE = true
}
All keys to be used has to be generated before the application server is started.
*** Generated HSM objects ***
EJBCA (the java PKCS#11 provider) needs three object on the HSM, which are all generated by the generate commands
above:
A private key
A public key
A certificate - this is simply a holder of the public key used by java, and not the real certificate of a CA
Note
Normally when generating keys on the PKCS#11 HSM there will be a label on the certificate but not on the private and public
key. You can add a CKA_LABEL attribute to the attributes file to get a label on the private and public keys as well. The value
of the attribute is a hexadecimal string starting with "0h". These labels are normally seen only when you use the native HSM
tools to list and manipulate objects.
attributes(*,*,*) = {
CKA_TOKEN = true
CKA_LABEL = 0h6b657931
}
The example above gives the label 'key1' to the private key. You can give any label by simply looking up the hex codes of
characters in the ascii table.
*** SUN or IAIK PKCS#11 Provider ***
The IAIK PKCS#11 provider have support for more algorithms than the SUN provider, and therefore you can choose which
provider to use. EJBCA first tries to load the IAIK provider, and if that is not available it uses the SUN provider. The SUN
provider is always available in JDK 5 and later. To enable the IAIK provider you must do the following:
Purchase server licenses for the IAIK PKCS#11 provider and obtain the files. Visit their website for more information.
Copy three jar files to the application servers class path, for JBoss this is usually APPSRV_HOME/server/default/lib. The
jar files needed are: iaikPkcs11Provider.jar, iaikPkcs11Wrapper.jar and iaik_jce.jar.
Copy the PKCS#11 provider shared library to the library search path for your platform. On linux this might be done by
copying libpkcs11wrapper.so to /usr/lib.
Start JBoss, EJBCA should now use the IAIK PKCS#11 provider instead of the SUN provider.
Utimaco CryptoServer
The Utimaco PKCS11 module have a configurable timeout (AppTimeout) that clears all session information if you do not use the
keys for some time. The default time-out is 30 minutes, which may be way too short if your CA is not very very active. We
recommend that you set this timeout to a longer value, several days.
Put a configuration file in /etc/utimaco/cs2_pkcs11.ini:
[Global]
Timeout = 5000
Logging = 0
Logpath = /tmp
[CryptoServer]
Device = TCP:3001@172.16.175.128
Timeout = 600000
AppTimeout = 172800
SlotCount = 100
The timeout in this example of 172800 seconds will allow your CA to idle for a long time.
When using a PKCS#11 token you should first create keys with the command: $EJBCA_HOME/clientToolBox-
dist/ejbcaClientToolBox.sh PKCS11HSMKeyTool generate
Each slot must have been initialized before keys could be generated on the them. This includes setting a user PIN for it. The slot
must also require login. Tools for doing this is not provided from EJBCA. The HSM vendor should provide this tool.
Here follows an example on how to initialize a slot and generate keys to be used by EJBCA. The password is user1:
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You can view the pkcs11 objects created with the command:
slot 1
defaultKey defaultKey
certSignKey signKey
crlSignKey signKey
testKey testKey
pin user1
sharedLibrary /opt/utimaco/p11/libcs2_pkcs11.so
Utimaco have an emulator for their CryptoServer LAN HSM that can be used for test and development. If you have the emulation
kit there is a howto in doc/howto/cryptoserver-lan-emulator.txt with steps to follow in order to use it with EJBCA.
You can check the status of a CryptoServer LAN device, for example the emulator with:
Although not recommended it is possible to import keys from a p12 file to CryptoServer. These steps were contributed by
Philipp Vogt and Helmut Edlhaimb-Rexeis. The tools used are a combination of p11tool that ships with Utimaco HSMs and
"ejbcaClientToolBox.sh PKCS11HSMKeyTool".
Import the .p12 file with p11Tool from Utimaco (into slot 20 in this example).
p11tool Slot=22 AuthRSASign=GenPKIAd,:cs2:cyb:/dev/ttyS0 Login=123456 ID=TestCA2XYID
ImportP12=mycert.p12,1234
It is absolutely necessary to set an unique id (ID=...) at import time.
The key alias for the imported key is set to "X509 Certificate" (taken from the imported certificate) and cannot be
change at import time.
Rename the key alias to an unique key alias with "PKCS11HSMKeyTool rename" from ejbcaClientToolbox.
ejbcaClientToolBox.sh PKCS11HSMKeyTool rename /etc/utimaco/libcs2_pkcs11.so 20 "X509 Certificate" "TestCA2Key"
The new key alias is set to the label and the id of the CKO_CERTIFICATE and the id of the CKO_PRIVATE_KEY.
Optional: Delete the public key with p11Tool using Label="RSA Public Key".
p11tool Slot=20 Login=123456 Label="RSA Public Key" DeleteObject
Test the keys, to make sure they are usable from EJBCA.
ejbcaClientToolBox.sh PKCS11HSMKeyTool test ./libcs2_pkcs11.so 20 1
Make sure no other public keys using this label are present in the HSM. Even if more than one .p12 file needs to be imported
only one at a time can be imported and renamed. The import and the rename process are tied together and cannot be
separated.
nCipher nShield/netHSM
This subsection describes how the nShield card from nCipher is used.
First the card has to be installed and admin and operator card sets has to be created. This is described in step 1.
Step 2 describes environments variables that must be set before generating keys and installing a new CA.
Step 3-5 describes PKCS#11 keys are generated and how different CAs within an installation is configured to use these keys. In
earlier versions of this manual it was also described how the nCipher JCA provider could be used by EJBCA. This has been
removed since PKCS#11 keys are better in every respect.
Set the nCipher box to initialization mode by setting the switch to mode 'I'.
Clear the nCipher box by pressing the reset button on the device
nfast@donny:/home/lars/work$ /opt/nfast/bin/enquiry
Server:
enquiry reply flags none
enquiry reply level Six
serial number 41C5-BA04-6D2C
mode operational
version 2.23.6
speed index 147
rec. queue 442..642
level one flags Hardware HasTokens
version string 2.23.6cam5, 2.22.6cam7 built on Apr 25 2005 18:15:46
checked in 00000000431dca98 Tue Sep 6 18:58:00 2005
level two flags none
max. write size 8192
level three flags KeyStorage
level four flags OrderlyClearUnit HasRTC HasNVRAM HasNSOPermsCmd ServerHasPollCmds FastPollSlotList HasSEE HasKLF Ha
module type code 0
product name nFast server
device name
EnquirySix version 4
impath kx groups
feature ctrl flags none
features enabled none
version serial 0
remote server port 9004
Module #1:
enquiry reply flags none
enquiry reply level Six
serial number 41C5-BA04-6D2C
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mode pre-initialisation
version 2.22.6
speed index 147
rec. queue 9..152
level one flags Hardware HasTokens InitialisationMode PreMaintInitMode
version string 2.22.6cam7 built on Apr 25 2005 18:15:46
checked in 00000000426636cd Wed Apr 20 13:02:37 2005
level two flags none
max. write size 8192
level three flags KeyStorage
level four flags OrderlyClearUnit HasRTC HasNVRAM HasNSOPermsCmd ServerHasPollCmds FastPollSlotList HasSEE HasKLF Ha
module type code 6
product name nC1002P/nC3022P
device name #1 nFast PCI device, bus 0, slot 13.
EnquirySix version 5
impath kx groups DHPrime1024
feature ctrl flags LongTerm
features enabled StandardKM
version serial 24
rec. LongJobs queue 8
SEE machine type gen1AIF
nfast@donny:/home/lars/work$
The '-Q K/N' option tells how many administration cards that are created N. K of these cards will be needed to restore a module
with a backup of the security world. '1/1' is a bad choice in production but will do in this example. Choose K>=3 and N>K in
production.
Creating Cardset:
Module 1: 0 cards of 3 written
Module 1 slot 0: Admin Card #1
Module 1 slot 0: empty
Module 1 slot 0: blank card
Module 1 slot 0:- passphrase specified - writing card (naming `EJBCA card 1')
Module 1: 1 card of 3 written
Module 1 slot 0: remove already-written card #1
Module 1 slot 0: empty
Module 1 slot 0: blank card
Module 1 slot 0:- passphrase specified - writing card (naming `EJBCA card 2')
Module 1: 2 cards of 3 written
Module 1 slot 0: remove already-written card #2
Module 1 slot 0: empty
Module 1 slot 0: blank card
New passphrases do not match; please try again.
Module 1 slot 0:- passphrase specified - writing card (naming `EJBCA card 3')
Card writing complete.
This will generate 3 cards of the card set named 'ejbca'. Any 2 of these cards will be needed when generating keys and starting
ejbca. Different card sets could be used for different CAs.
Note
The preload command (see below) must always be called as the same user unless the directory /opt/nfast/kmdata/preload is
removed.
If you get a "HostDataAccessDenied" error when running preload or starting JBoss, it is because the file permissions on the
directory /opt/nfast/kmdata/preload is wrong. It's probably because you (sometime) ran preload as another user, such as root or
nfast.
Load the card set so that keys protected by the card set could be generated:
Loading `ejbca':
Module 1 slot 0: `ejbca' #3 (`EJBCA card 3')
Module 1 slot 0:- passphrase supplied - reading card
Module 1 slot 0: `ejbca' #3 (`EJBCA card 3'): already read
Module 1 slot 0: empty
Module 1 slot 0: `ejbca' #2 (`EJBCA card 2')
Module 1 slot 0:- passphrase supplied - reading card
Card reading complete.
Step 3. Create PKCS#11 keys that should be used on the nShield card
Start a new window and login as the same user (jboss user). Create a file (ocs-sunpkcs11.cfg) with the following contents:
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name=NFastJava
library=/opt/nfast/toolkits/pkcs11/libcknfast.so
slotListIndex=1
attributes(generate,CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_PRIVATE = true
CKA_SIGN = true
CKA_DECRYPT = true
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
Note
An ECC key could not be used with preload (at least not the curve secp160r1). Such a key is generated OK and could be used as
long as the current preload is running. But if all preload processes are stopped and then if then preload is restarted the key could
not be used. This means that ECC could only be used with a 1/n OCS.
Now 3 keys protected by the key set 'ejbca' are created like this:
Properties are defined according to the "Generic PKCS#11 provider" section above.
All preloaded operator card sets (OCSs) has it's own slot. It is not possible to predict the slot ID. But the index of the slot in the
slot list is predictable. "slotListIndex" must therefore be used. If only one OCS is preloaded this index is always 1.
If several CAs is sharing same OCS (and hence slot) each key (identified by a key label) may only be used for one CA but the test
key. Same test key could be used for all CAs.
Example with previous generated keys where signRoot is used for CAs signing, and defaultRoot is used for everything else
(encryption):
When preload is used no authentication code is needed to activate a CA. You could give any value for the authentication code
when activating. The 'pin' property could be used in the configuration to automatically activate a CA. The value of this property
could be anything.
defaultKey defaultRoot
testKey test
keyEncryptKey cryptRoot
hardTokenEncrypt cryptRoot
pin dummy
slotListIndex 1
sharedLibrary /opt/nfast/toolkits/pkcs11/libcknfast.so
When using PKCS#11 slot 0 is used to indicate module protection. The only other thing except using slot 0 you have to do is to
use a slightly different configuration file when creating the key. The file could look like this:
name=NFastJava
library=/opt/nfast/toolkits/pkcs11/libcknfast.so
slotListIndex=0
attributes(generate,CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_SIGN = true
CKA_DECRYPT = true
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
For PKCS#11 simple do not use the preload command. The authentication code is now needed when activating the CA.
The key to get this working is to set the environment variable CKNFAST_LOADSHARING=1. This environment variable is also
implicitly set when running with preload.
slots[0] CK_SLOT_INFO
slotDescription " "
manufacturerID "nCipher Corp. Ltd "
flags 5
flags & CKF_TOKEN_PRESENT
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slots[0] CK_TOKEN_INFO
label "loadshared accelerator "
manufacturerID "nCipher Corp. Ltd "
model " "
serialNumber " "
flags 201
flags & CKF_RNG
flags & CKF_DUAL_CRYPTO_OPERATIONS
ulMaxSessionCount 1024
ulMaxRwSessionCount 1024
ulMaxPinLen 18446744073709551615
ulMinPinLen 0
ulTotalPublicMemory CK_UNAVAILABLE_INFORMATION
ulFreePublicMemory CK_UNAVAILABLE_INFORMATION
ulTotalPrivateMemory CK_UNAVAILABLE_INFORMATION
ulFreePrivateMemory CK_UNAVAILABLE_INFORMATION
hardware version 0.00
firmware version 0.00
utcTime " "
slots[1] CK_SLOT_INFO
slotDescription "1of2_0 "
manufacturerID "nCipher Corp. Ltd "
flags 6
flags & CKF_REMOVABLE_DEVICE
flags & CKF_HW_SLOT
hardware version 0.00
firmware version 0.00
slots[5] CK_TOKEN_INFO
label "1of2_1 "
manufacturerID "nCipher Corp. Ltd "
model " "
serialNumber "ee6071c52a77370c"
flags 20D
flags & CKF_RNG
flags & CKF_LOGIN_REQUIRED
flags & CKF_USER_PIN_INITIALIZED
flags & CKF_DUAL_CRYPTO_OPERATIONS
ulMaxSessionCount 1024
ulMaxRwSessionCount 1024
ulMaxPinLen 18446744073709551615
ulMinPinLen 0
ulTotalPublicMemory CK_UNAVAILABLE_INFORMATION
ulFreePublicMemory CK_UNAVAILABLE_INFORMATION
ulTotalPrivateMemory CK_UNAVAILABLE_INFORMATION
ulFreePrivateMemory CK_UNAVAILABLE_INFORMATION
hardware version 0.00
firmware version 0.00
utcTime " "
You then got to identify your OCSs with the slot index. The "label" in the list gives the name you gave to your OCS when creating
it. Then you get the slot list index from the x in "slot[x]. Use this for "slotListIndex" in the CA properties.
When using a 1/n OCS one card of the OCS must be inserted when activating a CA. If the OCS is persistent then the card could be
removed and you could then activate another CA by inserting its OCS.
To make the OCS persistent use the "-p" argument at "createocs" time, if this is not the case as soon as the card is removed then
the cardset will unload itself.
When using k/n OCS where k>1 you got to load all OCSs to be used with preload and then start the application server also with
preload. Example:
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When the application server then is started with preload, CAs defined for slot list index 2 and 4 could be activated. When
activating a CA when running preload no PIN has to be given. Also when the application server is started with preload then only
CAs of preloaded slots could be activated (not preloaded 1/n slots could not be used).
If you want to use the Loadsharing with multiple modules, be it PCI cards of NetHSM's then you must ensure you have a 1/N OCS
and the N quorum to be able to have enough cards to be inserted in every HSM you want to load balance the key at server/CA
start up when logging in.
With load balancing you need to have CKNFAST_LOADSHARING=1. Preload implicitly sets CKNFAST_LOADSHARING.
Note
If preload is used fail-over to the other HSM if one of the HSMs is broken is not working.
When activating a CA you need a smart card from the OCS of the corresponding slot inserted in both HSMs. The OCS got to be 1/n
since preload can not be used.
name=NFastJava
library=/opt/nfast/toolkits/pkcs11/libcknfast.so
slotListIndex=1
attributes(generate,CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_PRIVATE = true
CKA_SIGN = true
CKA_DECRYPT = true
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
Sample catoken.properties for generating the initial AdminCA on the netHSM, or entering in the admin-GUI when creating a new
CA.
defaultKey defaultKey
certSignKey defaultSign
crlSignKey defaultSign
testKey testKey
sharedLibrary /opt/nfast/toolkits/pkcs11/libcknfast.so
slotListIndex 1
AEP Keyper
The documement xxxxxxKeyperP11.pdf (xxxxxx is six digits) describes how the HSM is installed. As default there is only one slot -
0.
The HSM needs a configuration file when generating the keys. It could look like this:
name=Keyper
library=/Users/flourish/Keyper/PKCS11Provider/pkcs11.GCC4.0.1_i386.so.4.04
slot=0
attributes(generate,CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_SIGN = true
CKA_DECRYPT = true
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
ARX CoSign
This HSM only works on Windows. The installation is done with an installer and the setup with a GUI.
All generated keys will be on slot 1. The PIN code used when activating the keys could be anything since the authentication is
made when login on to the user that runs EJBCA. The shared library is called C:\windows\system32\sadaptor.dll
Bull Trustway
Do the installation of the card according to Install_and_Use_cc2000.pdf. When the card is "installed" it is ready to use with EJBCA.
Only one slot (slot index 0) is available. The slot is not protected by any PIN so an undefined 'pin' (empty) property may be used
in the configuration.
The configuration file used when generating a key with 'pkcs11HSM.sh' must look like this:
name=TrustWay
library=../../bullInstall/linux/libgpkcs11cc2000.so
slotListIndex=0
attributes(generate,CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
When using PKCS11HSMKeyTool and starting EJBCA, libcc2000_tok.so and libgpkcs11cc2000.so must be in the library path.
Examples:
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SafeNet Luna
Please consult the SafeNet documentation regarding the installation of HW and SW.
*** Configuration ***
Do all steps (1-7 in the section) in "A - Configuration (Setup Appliance after Installing)" of in the html document "Luna SA
Online Help -- Document # 800274-xxx" that should be found on your installation CD. Some notes about our test setup:
Step 3: You may do nothing here. But note that changing many of the policies will reset the HSM. This means that you can't
change any of these policies later on.
Step 4: Note that a new partition could be added at any time. Each partition will be represented as a PKCS#11 slot. Make sure
to write the Record Partition Client Password (TP) in a text file. In the example the password is btqx-EFGH-3456-7/K9 for the
first created partition (slot 1). The TP will later be used as PIN for the slot.
Step 5: A good idea is to allow partitions (p11 slots) to be "activated". If a partition is not activated you got to insert the black
key in the PED and give PIN each time a resource in the HSM is used by the client. So in most cases you want to be able to
activate a partition: lunash:>partition changePolicy -partition partition1 -policy 22 -value 1
Step 6: You don't have to be in the '/usr/LunaSA/bin' directory as the documentation says. We think it is preferable to be in a
directory owned by yourself so you don't have to use sudo. Example of running in your own directory:
Example of occasions when sudo must be used is registration of server and adding client certificates (root owned files and
directories are used and updated):
Step 7: Each partition assigned to a client will be represented by a PKCS#11 slot for this client. It seems that each new added
partition will be put last in the slot list and the number of a slot will be slot list index plus 1 (list index starting with 0 and slot
number starting with 1). To get the partition slot mapping on the client do:
Now the client may use these slot with EJBCA and it's tools
*** Activating slots ***
Before a partition (slot) could be used by a client it must be activated. This is described in 'B - Administration & Maintenance >
Activating and AutoActivating Partitions'. The partition policy required do the activation must have been set (see step5 above).
Example to activate a partition:
lunash:>hsm login
lunash:>partition activate -partition partition1 -password btqx-EFGH-3456-7/K9
name=Luna
library=/usr/lunasa/lib/libCryptoki2_64.so
#library=/usr/lib/pkcs11-spy.so
slot = 1
attributes(generate,*,*) = {
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
attributes(generate,CKO_PUBLIC_KEY,*) = {
CKA_ENCRYPT = true
CKA_VERIFY = true
CKA_WRAP = true
}
attributes(generate, CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_EXTRACTABLE = false
CKA_DECRYPT = true
CKA_SIGN = true
CKA_UNWRAP = true
}
*** List and test all keys that could be used by EJBCA ***
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This is a sample configuration of the Hard Token Properties for PKCS#11 token when creating a new CA.
sharedLibrary=/usr/lunasa/lib/libCryptoki2_64.so
slot=1
certSignKey=myECCKey
crlSignKey=myECCKey
defaultKey=default
attributesFile=/home/ejbca/lunasatoken.cfg
attributes(generate,*,*) = {
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
attributes(generate,CKO_PUBLIC_KEY,*) = {
CKA_ENCRYPT = true
CKA_VERIFY = true
CKA_WRAP = true
}
attributes(generate, CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_EXTRACTABLE = false
CKA_DECRYPT = true
CKA_SIGN = true
CKA_UNWRAP = true
}
SafeNet ProtectServer
Install the software according to the installation instructions for the ProtectServer. Below are sample commands for installing
the SDK rpm on an Ubuntu system, wich means first converting it to a deb.
Using the SDK you can use the SDK as a good emulator for testing and development. If you are installing with a real
ProtectServer you should install the Runtime instead of the SDK. When using the SDK you may use /opt/ETcpsdk/lib/linux-
x86_64 instead of /opt/PTK/lib
*** Set passw ords for admin SO och admin user ***
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/opt/PTK/lib /opt/PTK/bin/ctconf
See "Programming in FIPS mode" in the Protect Toolkit-C Programmers Manual for information about this flag.
If JBoss was started you have to restart JBoss before the keys becomes available in EJBCA.
*** Contents of ./slot5.cfg ***
name=SafeNet
library=/opt/PTK/lib/libcryptoki.so
#library=/usr/lib/pkcs11-spy.so
slot=5
attributes(*,*,*) = {
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
attributes(*,CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_PRIVATE = true
CKA_SIGN = true
CKA_DECRYPT = true
CKA_EXTRACTABLE = true
CKA_SENSITIVE = true
}
When you create the CA in EJBCA you can now use the simple CA token properties below.
certSignKey defaultSign
crlSignKey defaultSign
defaultKey default
testKey test
sharedLibrary=/opt/PTK/lib/libcryptoki.so
slot=5
attributesFile=/opt/slot5p11.cfg
attributes(*,*,*) = {
CKA_TOKEN = true
}
attributes(*,CKO_PRIVATE_KEY,*) = {
CKA_PRIVATE = true
CKA_SIGN = true
CKA_DECRYPT = true
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CKA_EXTRACTABLE = true
CKA_SENSITIVE = true
}
Note
The slot5p11.cfg is needed because the ProtectServer has some strange default attributes. If you do not specify an attributes
file the private key will not be 'sensitive' and will be possible to export in clear text by any user of the HSM. You can see the
attributes of the keys by running the test command:
the attributes are listed as "token object, sensitive, extractable", and here is important that is says 'sensitive' (extractable only
means that the key can be backed up securely using SafeNet tools).
Note
The above means that if you have more than one CA using the same slot it is very important that BOTH CA token properties
configurations contains the attributesFile. This is because the attributes are applied when the provider is installed during
startup. If one configuration does not have the attributesFile it can not be applied later on by the other configuration.
Note
The emulator has a bug. Each key of same length that are generated seems to be the same. This means that a slot may only
have one key. If a second key is generated for a slot the certificate object for the first key is deleted before writing the certificate
object for the new key. This is done since the Sun p11 wrapper provider does not allow two keys that are equal to be present in a
keystore.
You can also generate keys, and the needed self signed certificate, using the SafeNet tools delivered with the HSM. This is for
example suitable when you want to generate ECC keys, since there is a bug in the JDK which prevents this without patching
the JDK.
For example, the below commands generates an ECC key with curve P-256 on slot 1, storing it on the HSM with alias 'foo',
assigning a selfsigned certificate to it and finally listing the object of slot 1.
cd /opt/ETCprt/bin/linux-x86-64
./ctkmu c -tec -nfoo -aPSVXxTRD -s1 -CP-256
./ctcert c -s1 -lfoo
./ctkmu l -s1
If JBoss was started you have to restart JBoss before the keys becomes available in EJBCA.
EJBCA have a modular API for HSMs, HardCAToken. For every CA that is created a HardCAToken object is also created. This object
contains among other things references to keys (or the keys themselves of a soft token is used). For each HSM hardware that
should be supported you need one HardCAToken class that implementes support for this particular HSM. A hard ca token plug-in
must:
1. implement ICAToken
2. it is recommended to extend BaseCAToken, since BaseCAToken implements handling of all properties, autoactivation and
such
3. be loaded at the static initialization if CATokenManager where it is registered with the CATokenManager using the method
addAvailableCAToken()
4. Provide a JCE Security Provider that is installed by the module and can be fetched by the EJBCA crypto module
(BouncyCastle) through the name returned in ICAToken.getProvider().
See HardCATokenSample and/or DummyHardCAToken for samples. Unlike the sample addAvailableCAToken() must be called with
use=true, or the token will not be usable in EJBCA (as the flag suggests).
The Publisher architecture is modular and it's possible to implement custom publishers that can also be easily integrated and set up in
the admin-GUI.
LDAP Naming
A good book to understand LDAP naming is "Understanding and Deploying LDAP Directory Services". The recommended method of
choosing a naming suffix is the one described in RFC2247 that maps a DNS domain to a DN. If my DNS domain is bigcorp.com it
will map to the DN "dc=bigcorp,dc=com". The top node in my LDAP directory will then be "dc=bigcorp,dc=com".
The dc component support is mandated by all of the X.509 RFCs now. For example, if I have this directory:
dc=bigcorp,dc=com
|
+-dc=fi
|
|
+-dc=se
|
+-cn=Mike Jackson
The most understandable method is taking the subject name in forward order, like: cn=Mike Jackson,dc=se,dc=bigcorp,dc=com
If the DN is ordered like this it should be published to the correct object in the tree.
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If the DN is ordered reverse, like: dc=bigcorp,dc=com,dc=se,cn=Mike Jackson EJBCA will reorder it incorrectly to forward order,
so the publishing will be wrong.
Therefore... Use forward order like this: 'cn=Mike Jackson,dc=se,dc=bigcorp,dc=com' if using the dc model or
'cn=Mike Jackson,o=bigcorp,c=se' if using the o,c model.
Making unique LDAP DNs is the next challenge. If you are in a small organization having the CN will probably work fine, but in a
larger organization there are probably several people with the same name. Somehow the names must be made unique, and one
way is to introduce numbers, initials etc in the CN. Another way that we recommend is to use uid in the LDAP DN instead. LDAP
DNs will then looks like "uid=tomas,dc=bigcorp,dc=com". Uid is the users username, normally used for login etc, and you probably
already have some procedure to create unique usernames already.
LDAP Basics
LDAP has an unusual structure, if you are not used to X.500 style naming. Things are either branches, or leaf nodes. You can't
just drop an object anywhere you like; You need to create the framework to support it. Sort of like if you wanted to put entries in
/etc/hosts, if the directory /etc did not exist.
First you mkdir /etc, Then you create the file. Then you start putting things in the file. The difference with LDAP and x.500 is that
instead of paths separate by slashes, you have paths separated by commas and '=' signs.
For example, if you want to make an object "cn=ldaphost,ou=hosts,dc=yourdom,dc=com", you first have to make sure
"dc=yourdom,dc=com" exists.
Then make sure
"ou=hosts,dc=yourdom,dc=com" exists.
THEN you can try
"cn=ldaphost,ou=hosts,dc=yourdom,dc=com"
EJBCA does not create branches in LDAP. You have to put them there with other means, before you start publishing.
*** Using LDAP ***
Examples of using LDAP with Firefox can be found in the howto-section of this web page.
To use LDAP top fetch user certificates and use them for encrypting email there seems to be a requirement to use SSL
connection to the LDAP server (Account Options->Compositions & Addressing->Edit directories->Edit->Use Secure
Connection), see also below how to configure OpenLDAP for SSL.
Note: When fetching certificates from LDAP with Firefox for example with URL:
ldap://ldap-server-host/dc=bigcorp,dc=com??sub?(cn=MyName)?(objectclass=*)
To get a checkbox at the fetched certificate, the CA certificate must be installed in the Windows truststore, not only in
Firefox's.
To use SSL against an LDAP server with MS Outlook you must make sure the CN in the LDAP servers certificate is the same as
the hostname. An example of adding a user for the LDAP server with the CLI interface is:
bin/ejbca.sh ra adduser ldap password "C=SE,O=Foo,CN=ldap.foo.se" null MyCA null 1 PEM SERVER
where ldap.foo.se is the hostname of the LDAP server that Outlook should use.
Example:
dn: cn=ejbca,dc=jackson,dc=net
objectClass: top
objectClass: applicationProcess
objectClass: certificationAuthority
cn: ejbca
cACertificate;binary:
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certificateRevocationList;binary:
authorityRevocationList;binary:
To configure OpenLDAP (version 2.2.5) to include the 'inetOrgPerson' you must add the following lines to slapd.conf. This is
already the default in recent releases:
include /etc/ldap/schema/cosine.schema
include /etc/ldap/schema/inetorgperson.schema
Don't forget to add the top object by creating an LDIF file (org.ldif):
dn: o=AnaTom,c=SE
objectclass: dcObject
objectclass: organization
o: AnaTom
dc: AnaTom
dn: cn=Admin,o=AnaTom,c=SE
objectclass: organizationalRole
cn: Admin
Create a user in ejbca (this example is for adding a user with the cli interface, adding a user with the admin-GUI works just as
fine). In the mail ejbca directory type (use simply 'ra' on windows):
bin/ejbca.sh ra adduser ldap foo123 "C=SE,O=Foo,CN=ldap" null AdminCA1 null 1 PEM SERVER
bin/ejbca.sh ra setclearpwd ldap foo123
Where foo123 is the ldap users password, C=SE... is the users DN and AdminCA1 is the name you chose for your CA. The user
type is end-user (1), keystore type is PEM, and if using the admin-GUI check 'use batch'). Batch generate the PEM keystore:
bin/ejbca.sh batch
Copy the resulting files p12/pem/ldap.pem, p12/pem/ldap-CA.pem and p12/pem/ldap-Key.pem to your LDAP server. In this
example the slapd.conf is located in /etc/ldap so we copy the files to that directory. Protect theses files so they are only
readable by the LDAP server. Add the following to your slapd.conf:
# Use SSL
TLSCipherSuite HIGH:MEDIUM:+SSLv3
TLSCertificateFile /etc/ldap/ldap.pem
TLSCertificateKeyFile /etc/ldap/ldap-Key.pem
TLSCACertificateFile /etc/ldap/ldap-CA.pem
Restart slapd:
On SuSE, if using the builtin OpenLDAP you have to enable ldaps in /etc/sysconfig/openldap:
OPENLDAP_START_LDAPS="yes"
SuSEconfig
and then
rcldap start
Configure your LDAP publisher in EJBCA to use SSL by checking the checkbox 'Use SSL', the port should change to port 636.
Note! The CA certificate of the (root)CA used to sign the ldap server certificate must be present in the java trust cert store
($JAVA_HOME/jre/lib/security/cacerts). If you use the default CA created when ejbca was installed this is already included.
Otherwise you will have to add it using something like: First get the CA cert:
keytool -import -trustcacert -alias MyCA -keystore $JAVA_HOME/jre/lib/security/cacerts -storepass changeit -file myca.
You have to re-start JBoss after adding anything to the java trust store.
dn: dc=PrimeKey,dc=com
dc: PrimeKey
objectclass: dcObject
objectclass: organization
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o: PrimeKey Solutions AB
description: Parent Object for PrimeKey LDAP Directory
dn: ou=Standard,dc=PrimeKey,dc=com
ou: Standard
objectClass: top
objectClass: organizationalUnit
description: Parent Object for all Standard Certificates
dn: ou=High,dc=PrimeKey,dc=com
ou: High
objectClass: top
objectClass: organizationalUnit
description: Parent Object for all High Certificates
A Publisher is a session bean that implements the IPublishSession interface and is used to store certificates and CRLs for entities.
EJBCA have support for endless number of publishers simply by defining publishers in the admin-GUI. The user of EJBCA can
implement own publishers, but EJBCA already comes with a publisher for LDAP.
EJBCA uses a notion of base DN to publish to different LDAP structures. The DN used in the certificate can be different from the
LDAP structure.
*** Configuring EJBCA ***
'Hostnames' is ';'-separated list of the hosts where the LDAP servers are located. E.g. "ldap.company.com" or
"ldap1.company.com;ldap2.company.com". Only the first available of the listed hosts will be used.
'Port' is the port on which the LDAP server listens, default non-SSL is 389.
'Login DN' is the DN of a user on the LDAP server with permissions to add and update entities.
'Login Password' is the password for the user above.
'Connection timeout' is number of milliseconds a server has to respond before it is considered unavailable and the next
server in the list of hostnames (if any) is used instead. This timeout is used to probe LDAP servers, to create
connections, to bind and to disconnect.
'Read timeout' is number of milliseconds a server has to complete a LDAP search or read operation before it times out
and fails.
'Store timeout' is number of milliseconds a server has to complete a LDAP store operation before it times out and fails.
This can take a little longer if you store very large CRLs in LDAP.
'Create Nonexisting Users' defines if an LDAP object should be created by EJBCA if it is no existing object when EJBCA
publishes the certificate.
'Modify Existing Users' defines if attributes (such as email) in existing LDAP objects are replaced with new values and/or
added when an entry is updated with a new certificate. If this option is not activated, existing users will not be touched
at all, even not updated with a new certificate.
'Overwrite Existing Attributes' When 'Modify Existing Users' is set to true this value determines whether to change
values of attributes when they already exist.
'Add Nonexisting Attributes' When 'Modify Existing Users' is set to true this value determines whether to add attributes
when they do not already exist.
'Add multiple certificates per user' defines if we should use multiple certificate entries for each user or only one. Default
only one certificate is added to a user entry in LDAP and if the user gets a new certificate the old one is deleted and
replaced with the new one. If this checkbox is checked certificates are instead appended in LDAP so each user can have
multiple certificate entries in LDAP. Make sure your applications can handle this before enabling this option. Revoking a
user will remove all certificates entries for the user.
'Remove certificates when revoked' if checked causes the publisher to remove a certificate from LDAP when the
certificate is revoked or suspended.
'Remove ldap user when certificate revoked' if checked causes the publisher to remove the whole LDAP user entry when
a certificate is revoked or suspended.
'Set userPassword attribute' specifies if the LDAP publisher should set the userPassword attribute in the LDAP object. If a
user entry with a non-null password is published, and this checkbox is checked, the userPassword attribute will be
populated with the user's password.
'User Object Class' is the objectclass for the LDAP entries for users, where user certificates are published. The entry is
hierarchical separated by ';' to build a structure like:
objectclass: top
objectclass: person
objectclass: organizationalPerson
objectclass: inetOrgPerson
This objectclass must allow the attribute 'userCertificate;binary'.
Default 'top;person;organizationalPerson;inetOrgPerson'
'CA Object Class' is the objectclass for the LDAP entries for CAs, where CA certificates and CRLs are published. The entry
is hierarchical separated by ';' to build a structure. This objectclass must allow the attributes 'cACertificate;binary',
'certificateRevocationList;binary' and 'authorityRevocationList;binary'.
Default 'top;applicationProcess;certificationAuthority'
'User Certificate Attribute' is the attribute name, in the userObjectClass, for the users certificate.
Default 'userCertificate;binary'.
'CA Certificate Attribute' is the attribute name, in the cAObjectClass, for the CAs certificate.
Default 'cACertificate;binary'.
'CRL Attribute' is the attribute name, in the cAObjectClass, for CRLs (user CRLs) publisher by the CA.
Default 'certificateRevocationList;binary'.
'ARL Attribute' is the attribute name, in the cAObjectClass, for ARLs (CA CRLs) publisher by the CA.
Default 'authorityRevocationList;binary' (note that pure ARLs are not implemented yet in EJBCA).
'LDAP location fields from cert DN' When configuring the LDAP publisher the BaseDN will be used as the base for the DN
published in LDAP, and it will be appended to the LDAP location fields selected to be used. example: If the user DN in
EJBCA is "cn=tomas gustavsson, uid=tomasg, O=PrimeKey Solutions AB, C=SE" and the BaseDN is
"dc=PrimeKey,dc=SE" and the selected LDAP location fields are "CN". The LDAP DN used for publishing will be "cn=tomas
gustavsson, dc=PrimeKey, dc=SE", and the "uid=tomasg" will be added as an attribute in LDAP. The certificate stored
under "cn=tomas gustavsson, dc=PrimeKey, dc=SE" will have the subjectDN "cn=tomas gustavsson, uid=tomasg,
O=PrimeKey Solutions AB, C=SE".
To publish in LDAP you must create a Certificate profile in EJBCA that publishes to LDAP. If the above is configured, there will
be a section for 'Publishers' available when creating/editing a certificate profile (with 'Edit Certificate Profiles'). Choose this,
and then when adding end-entities, make sure they use the new certificate profile and voila, the certs will be published.
*** Different LDAP publishers ***
LDAP Publisher
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When ejbca creates an object to publish a certificate to LDAP it firsts builds the DN from the baseDN and 'LDAP location fields
for cert DN'. It checks if the entry exists in the ldap and either creates or modifies the entry.
Example: The certificate DN is "CN=Tomas Gustavsson,O=Foo,C=SE", the BaseDN in the publisher is "DC=primekey,DC=se"
and the CN is selected in "LDAP location fields from cert DN".
The resulting DN that EJBCA will search for in the LDAP and create if it does not already exist is "CN=Tomas
Gustavsson,DC=primekey,DC=se".
Using this publisher, if you have multiple trees in your LDAP (for example "ou=foo,dc=primekey,dc=se" and
"ou=bar,dc=primekey,dc=se") you can either:
1. Include both CN and OU in 'LDAP location fields from cert DN' and have your cert DNs like
"CN=Tomas,OU=foo,O=MyOrg,C=SE.
2. Use different publishers for ou=foo and ou=bar and issue certificates for the different OUs with different certificate
profiles.
The search filter is defined in the two fields under "LDAP search settings":
Suffix base DN of LDAP Search - the base for your search filter.
LDAP filter of the search - your LDAP filter.
If you build your search filter on DN components, you also have to select thos components as 'LDAP location fields'.
The best example of such a search filter is if base is "dc=primekey,dc=se" and filter is "uid=$USERNAME". The search done by
ejbca will be equal to the search:
ldapsearch -x -b "dc=primekey,dc=se" "(uid=$USERNAME)"
$USERNAME is replaced by the EJBCA username of the user that has had a new certificate just generated. Other variables
apart from $USERNAME is $EMAIL, $UID, $CN, $O, $OU and $C where these values are taken from the certificate DN.
When a certificate is generated for say user "ldap" EJBCA will perform the search:
ldapsearch -x -b "dc=primekey,dc=se" "(uid=ldap)"
The certificate generated for ldap will be published in the object returned by the search. This is very useful if you want to
publish certificates to an LDAP directory where your users already exists, such as an email directory. The DN in the LDAP does
not have to match the DN in the certificates at all.
If more than one entry matches the search, the first returned search result will be used.
*** Publishing to Active Directory ***
When configuring Active Directory LDAP, Bind DN for the users are usually, cn=user,cn=Users,dc=domain-
component1,dc=domain-component2.
For example: cn=Philip Vendil,cn=Users,dc=primekey,dc=se for the domain primekey.se
For Login DN you should use the full ldap name, for example:
"CN=Administrator,CN=Users,dc=primekey,dc=se"
In order to connect to AD though SSL you should issue a LDAP SSL P12 to the domain controller. According to MS Article ID
321051
The same certificate is used for both the AD and global catalogue (GC). Remember to add the CA certificate to the machine
that stores trusted root certificates.
ldap:///CN=Test%20MS%20SC%20Logon%20CA%20v1,CN=somename,CN=CDP,CN=Public%20Key%20Services,CN=Services,
CN=Configuration,DC=somemachine,DC=primekey,DC=se?certificateRevocationList?base?objectClass=cRLDistributionPoint
The DN to be published is constructed from the certificate DN of the entity to be published. But if the publisher requires a DN
object that is not a part of the certificate DN then the DN defined for entity might be used instead.
The DN of the entity (user or CA) could have more objects than the certificate if "Use a Subset of Subject DN" is defined in the
used certificate profile.
The "LDAP Publisher" and the "LDAP Search Publisher" tries the DN of the entity when the certificate DN is missing an object
needed in the publishing DN
*** What EJBCA stores/creates/modifies ***
Apart from the DN in the entry a number of attributes are also stored, some are required by schema, some are optional.
EJBCA find attributes in the certificate, if it is an OU (organizational unit) in the certificate EJBCA uses that to populate the OU
attribute in the ldap entry.
When updating an entry that already exists EJBCA uses replace on the existing attributes, so if an email attributes already
exists and EJBCA finds an email address in the certificate, the email attribute in ldap is replaced with the email address from
the certificate.
Note that attributes are only replaced/updated if the flag "Modify Existing Users" in the Publisher is active. The certificate
attribute is always updated though.
Attributes that are part of the DN, i.e. that reflects the location of the entry in LDAP is not modified, since this is usually not
allowed.
cn (common name)
l (locality)
ou (organizational unit)
sn (surname)
gn (givenname)
st (state)
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o (organization)
uid (user id)
initials
title
serialnumber - If we have selected to use the SN (serialNUmber DN field) in 'Ldap Location fields', we will also add it as
an attribute.
To store certificates for devices (e.g. routers, toasters etc) in LDAP it is no really suitable standard object class. inetOrgPerson
requires surnames etc, and the device objectclass does not include a certificate attribute.
Mike Jackson has kindly contributed additional objects that extend the standard device class with a certificate attribute. The
ejbcaDevice uses object ids from PrimeKey Solutions AB.
*** Installation ***
For the Netscape/SUN servers, on UNIX, copy the 85ejbca.ldif file into:
/usr/netscape/servers/slapd-hostname/config/schema/
/etc/ldap/schema/
include /etc/ldap/schema/ejbca.schema
Custom publishers
If your setup makes it very complex to configure multiple certificate profiles and multiple publishers you might consider writing
a custom publisher that handles things directly according to you needs.
Look in the directory src/java/org/ejbca/core/model/ca/publishers for more information about writing your own solution. There
is an empty custom publisher called DummyCustomPublisher.java that can be extended.
*** Publishing w ith an external application ***
A lightweight alternative to developing a new custom publisher for exporting CRLs, certificates and revokations is to use the
General Purpose Custom Publisher (GPCP). This makes it possible to export DER-encoded CRLs, certificates and/or revokations
with a simple script (using scp or similar). The GPCP creates a temporary file and executes the script with the full pathname to
the temporary file as an argument.
It's possible to let the publisher ignore an error in the execution of a script by altering the publishers properties. By default,
the publisher detects both output to standard error and a non-zero errorlevel set by the script.
To start using the GPCP, select "Edit Publishers" in the Administration GUI. Add a publisher "GPCP" and then "Edit" the same.
Choose
crl.application /fullpathname/exportscript.sh
crl.failOnStandardError <true | false>
crl.failOnErrorCode <true | false>
crl.calclulateDeltaCrlLocally <true | false>
cert.application /fullpathname/exportscript.sh
cert.failOnStandardError <true | false>
cert.failOnErrorCode <true | false>
revoke.application /fullpathname/exportscript.sh
revoke.failOnStandardError <true | false>
revoke.failOnErrorCode <true | false>
and click "Save and Test Connection" to save the entered information and validate that the specified applications exist. Select
"Edit Certificate Authorities" in the Administration GUI and select "GPCP" as your new CRL publisher. Click "Save".
Test CRL publishing by selecting "Basic Functions" in the Administration GUI and click "Create CRL".
Test certificate publishing by selecting "Edit Certificate Authorities" in the Administration GUI, select a CA, click "Edit"
and then "Republish CA Certificates".
More advanced scripts or applications have the ability to use the additional argument
Depending on application, the GeneralPurposeCustomPublisher can calculate whether a CRL is a delta CRL. Set the parameter
crl.calclulateDeltaCrlLocally to true in order to do this, or false if you wish to check this in an external script (or not at all). The
result of this check, if run, will be last in the argument list to the script.
Publisher Queue and failures
To achieve robust publishing there is a publisher queue. When a publisher fails the published data is stored in a separate table in
the database, the PublishQueue. This queue can then be processed by a service (see Services Framework).
Publishers can also be configured not to publish directly at all, but to store everything in the queue, which is later processed. The
benefit of this approach is that publishing is instant. When issuing certificates the CA does not have to wait for all publishers to
finish. If there are many publishers this might delay the issuing process slightly.
Publisher Settings:
'Current length' - displays the number of new entries in the queue in the intervals <1 min, 1-10 min, 10-60 min and >60
min.
'No direct publishing, only use queue' - when enabled, the publisher does not try to publish directly but instead pushes the
update to the queue for later processing by a Publish Queue Process Service.
'Keep successfully published items in database' - when enabled items stored in the publisher queue will not be removed
when real publishing has been done, status will merely be changed from PENDING to SUCCESS.
'Use queue for CRLs' - determines if the publisher queue should handle CRLs or not for this publisher.
'Use queue for certificates' - determines if the publisher queue should handle certificates or not for this publisher.
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EJBCA support ECDSA signature keys in addition to RSA. You can create a CA using ECDSA keys both using the admin-GUI and using
the cli (bin/ejbca.sh ca init).
When using ECDSA keys, the CA signing keypair and the OCSP signer keypair will be the ECDSA keytype you select when creating
the CA. The CA signing and OCSP signing certificate will be signed using your selected signature algorithm.
The encryption keypair will always be RSA, using 1024 or 2048 bit key length. It uses the key length set in the admin-GUI or
2048 bit by default using the cli. A dummy encryption certificate will be created using SHA1WithRSA.
Using ECDSA with an HSM
See the section about HSM property parameters to see which keys can be of different sorts. Note that the keyEncryptKey can not
be ECDSA, but should be an RSA key. Your HSM must support both ECDSA and RSA keys. You can use PKCS11HSMKeyTool from
the clientToolBox to generate keys and certificate requests from an HSM.
Normally you want to generate requests and certificates using named curves encoded in certificates and requests, this is what
IETF recommends. In some cases you need to generate the request and certificate with explicit parameters instead, this is for
instance mandated by ICAO for usage in CSCA's and DS's for ePassports.
When generating requests with clientToolBox PKCS11HSMKeyTool certreq you can specify a flag to use explicit parameters
instead of named curves. Named curves is the default.
When EJBCA issues certificate with public keys from certificate requests (csr's) the key in the certificate will be the same as
in the csr. If the csr uses explicit parameters, so will the issued certificate.
Named curves
EJBCA supports the curves that BouncyCastle supports, they include named curves from Nist, SEC and X9.62. New curves may be
supported without this list being updated, give it a try! See Bouncycastle wiki for more information about ECDSA curves.
X9.62 curves:
prime192v1
prime192v2
prime192v3
prime239v1
prime239v2
prime239v3
prime256v1
SEC curves:
sect571r1
sect409r1
sect283r1
sect233r1
sect163r2
secp521r1
secp256r1
secp224r1
secp384r1
Nist curves:
P-224
P-256
P-384
P-521
B-163
B-233
B-283
B-409
B-571
Teletrust curves:
brainpoolp160r1
brainpoolp160t1
brainpoolp192r1
brainpoolp192t1
brainpoolp224r1
brainpoolp224t1
brainpoolp256r1
brainpoolp256t1
brainpoolp320r1
brainpoolp320t1
brainpoolp384r1
brainpoolp384t1
brainpoolp512r1
brainpoolp512t1
ImplicitlyCA curves
X9.62 provides 3 alternatives for the parameters that can be found in an EC public key. One of these is named implicitlyCA and
indicates that the parameters are defined else where, implicit in the name of the certification authority (CA) that issued the key.
In this situation the actual parameters appear in the ASN.1 encoding of the key as a DER encoded NULL.
As the definition says, when the key is used, the parameters will have to come from elsewhere. In EJBCA the parameters are
configured in conf/ejbca.properties.
When creating a new CA using the implicitlyCA facility, you first configure your curve parameters in conf/ejbca.properties and
issue commands:
ant clean
ant deploy
After restarting the application server you can now create a new CA using the name 'implicitlyCA' instead of a curve name as
keyspec in the admin-GUI or CLI.
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The CA certificate will now be created with the NULL encoding of the public key.
When issuing client certificates where the client public key uses implicitlyCA, you must allow key length 0 in the certificate profile,
because EJBCA can not read the key length, since the parameters are defined elsewhere.
See Bouncycastle wiki for more information about the implicitlyCA facility.
The curve parameters in conf/ejbca.parameters are configured in Bouncycastle using the following code:'
You can also issue normal requests for client certificates using ECDSA keys.
All certificates signed by an ECDSA CA will naturally use ECDSA signatures, regardless if the client keys are RSA or ECDSA.
When batch generating client keys using the cli command 'bin/ejbca.sh batch' you configure the type of client keys that will be
generated in the file bin/batchtool.properties. The possible parameters are explained there. If using the implicitlyCA facility the
same parameters as configured for the ca in conf/ejbca.properties are used.
Limitations
When using the 'implicitlyCA' mode only one set of curve parameters can be set for the whole EJBCA instance. This means that if
you have several CAs using ECDSA with 'implicitlyCA', they will all use the same curve parameters. You can mix 'implicitlyCA' with
named curves any way you like though.
Internationalization
To customize EJBCA admin GUI for your languages special characters you will probably have to change the default page encoding in
'web.contentencoding' (in conf/web.properties file) to for example UTF-8 instead of the default ISO-8859-1.
Displaying, receiving, decoding and storing different char sets is rather complicated and the architecture is multilayered. There are
the web browser, application server, database and operating system, all working together. If you change to UFT-8 to handle your char
set, you must probably also specify that the database connection should use UTF-8. For MySQL this can be done in the connection-url
in your datasource description (APPSRV_HOME/server/default/deploy/ejbca-ds.xml): jdbc:mysql://yourhost
/ejbca?characterEncoding=UTF-8
You will also want to configure the database, for example in my.cnf, to use UTF-8.
You also want to configure your machine to use the locale you are using, otherwise some encoding/decoding to the database may get
mixed up and throw a lot of errors (java XML decoding). For example in SUSE this is done with 'yast' and in Debian it is done with
'dpkg-reconfigure locales'.
For some languages (for example Chinese) the java scripts in the admin GUI will fail to recognize the characters when doing checks
for allowed characters in DN etc. The easiest way to resolve this is to go into the file:
src/adminweb/ejbcajslib.js
And change all methods 'checkfield*()' to always return true directly.
If you can't get you national characters to work with the admin GUI, you can try using the cli instead (bin/ejbca.sh ra adduser ...).
That usually works.
EJBCA have for example been tested on Windows/JBoss 4.2.0/MySQL and Linux/JBoss4.2.0/HSQL with the default configuration using
Swedish national characters, and it works nicely both with the cli and admin-GUI.
To make everything work perfect you MAY have to also configure JBoss to encode URIs according to your settings, this is done with
the 'URIEncoding' directory in APPSRV_HOME/server/default/deploy/jbossweb-tomcat55.sar/server.xml:
Java uses unicode internally, so the things that needs to be taken care of are:
1. Make sure your system locale is set correctly, so Java will recognize input of your nations language. If Java does not
automatically recognize your locale you might need to specify it as options to java during startup (i.e. in JBoss and cmd line
commands such as ca.sh and ra.sh). java -Duser.language=2-char-language-code -Duser.region=2-char-country-code
example for Swedish: java -Duser.language=sv -Duser.region=SE
2. Your database must also recognize the locale so it does not strip down to plain ascii. This is database and JDBC-driver
dependent.
The admin GUI is meant to support multiple languages through language files in src/adminweb/languages. In order to add a
language you should do the following:
1. Rename the languagefile you have created to language.languagecode.properties. In case of chinese it should be 'zh', and
place it in the src/adminweb/languages directory.
2. Edit conf/web.properties (create with conf/web.properties.sample as template if you don't have one). Change
'web.availablelanguages' and add your language code to the value. i.e: <env-entry-value>EN,FR,IT</env-entry-value>
3. You may have to change the default page encoding in 'web.contentencoding' to for example ISO-8859-1 instead of the
default UTF-8.
4. Clean and re-deploy ejbca with 'ant clean' followed by 'ant deploy'. Restart JBoss and your browser after this.
Now it should be possible to select EN, FR and IT in the system configuration as default language and in the administrator
preferences page. The language will be changed next time the administrator logs in.
Internal Internationalization
It's also possible to translate internal log comments, some exception messages and approval notifications. This is done separately
in it's own resource files since this is done internally in the core application and not in the web-layer.
The language used internally is configured in the conf/web.properties file by setting the properties intresources.preferredlanguage
and intresources.secondarylanguage to the language you want to use. The letters should be the same as the xx name in the
intresources.xx.properties files in the src/intresources directory. The secondary resource file is used if the resource isn't found in
the preferred language. This is a global setting that cannot be overridden by administrators own settings in the web-layer.
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In order to add such a DN you can simply call the DN for example: CN=MyCommonName,1.1.1.1=MyCustomOid,C=SE
Where 1.1.1.1 is your custom oid.
To get support for custom OIDs in the Admin-GUI you must edit the file src/java/profilemappings.properties and add your new OID in
the end. Just follow the example in the file, and you will get the possibility to add you oid in the End Entity Profile, and following that
also when adding new users. If you edit profilemappings.properties, you should also add an entry in src/adminweb/languages
/languagefile.XX.properties (where XX is you language). Otherwise your new field will be displayed as the key that you entered
(which is probably ok also) in the admin-GUI. The new field you must add in the language file is the last field in
profilemappings.properties, i.e. the LanguageConstant.
EJBCA will by default put unknown OIDs in the end so the DN will probably be displayed as:
CN=MyCommonName,C=SE,1.1.1.1=MyCustomOid (if looking at the asn1 coding, different application display in a different order
regardless of the asn1 coding).
If you need a particular order of DN components, you can add a file 'dncomponents.properties' in the directory ejbca/src/java. There is
a file called dncomponents.properties.sample in the distribution as a starting point (it shows the default ordering in EJBCA). You
custom oid must be placed in the right place in that file, and all components from the sample file should be included, or you will get
strange behaviour.
Using the dncomponents.properties file is only needed if you need to control the asn1 ordering of DN elements.
After updating dncomponents.properties you need to run 'ant clean' before re-deploying EJBCA.
A word of caution:
If you use custom oids, they better not become standard ones later on, because if the underlying asn.1 library in EJBCA starts to
know the oids as standard ones, things will be renamed in the database and you will have to do a database migration. Also you must
keep track of dncomponents.properties when upgrading EJBCA.
Having all these customizations off-course requires some maintenance on your part, so don't forget your customizations when
upgrading EJBCA to a new version.
Check RELEASE_NOTES for important changes!
altNames
Adding custom OIDs in altNames works the same way as for DN. When a custom oid is used the altName string in the database
will be for example "rfc822Name=foo@bar.com, 1.1.1.1=foobar".
A Custom oid is always added as OtherName using a simple UTF8String. See rfc3280 for definition of the OtherName altName.
The OtherName consists of:
Certificate extensions is configured in the file 'src/java/certextensions.properties' All extensions should have a id ranging from 1
up to 255, the number order is important.
After extensions have been added it is possible to select them for a certificate profile in the 'Edit Certificate Profile' page.
Examples of certificate extensions that you can configure with the BasicCertificateExtension are given in 'src/java
/certextensions.properties'.
MS application policies
NetscapeCertType
NetscapeComment
NetscapeCARevocationURL
NetscapeRevocationURL
...
To create an advanced extension it is required to create a java class extending the CertificateExtension abstract class. One
method getValue is required and the current user data, ca and certificate profile is sent to the extension in order to generate
dynamic extensions.
Here is an example of a simple advanced extension. To add this extension to EJBCA add it to to the classpath in
certextensions.properties, make sure the class is accessible in the classpath and redeploy.
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/**
* The main method that should return a DEREncodable
* using the input data (optional) or defined properties (optional)
*
* @see org.ejbca.core.model.ca.certextensions.CertificateExtension#getValue(org.ejbca.core.model.ra.UserDataVO,
*/
public DEREncodable getValue(UserDataVO userData, CA ca,
CertificateProfile certProfile) {
Logging
The are three different logging devices available for official events (creation of certificate etc) from EJBCA 3.6. These devices should
not be confused with the info/debug output that is sent to Log4J directly. You can find more information on how to configure Log4J in
$EJBCA_HOME/doc/howto/log4j.txt.
It is recommended to only allow new log-posts to the database-tables. More information on this can be found in $EJBCA_HOME/doc
/howto/HOWTO-database.txt.
Log4JLogDevice
Appends the information from the offical event to the console or file. This is the same target where all the other info/debug output
is sent to. There are no protection from alteration and events sent to this device cannot be fetched back to EJBCA for display in
the Admin GUI.
OldLogDevice
OldLogDevice stores log-events in the database. By using the addon HMAC-protection, alterations in a log event can be detected.
Viewed events can be exported from the Admin GUI.
ProtectedLogDevice
The ProtectedLogDevice has been deprecated in EJBCA 3.10, since it's hard to configure right and extremely
inefficient.
The ProtectedLogDevice stores log-events in the database and has the ability to detect changed or missing log-events. In an
environment where at least one node (EJBCA-instance) is constantly running, the log cannot even be rolled back to a an earlier
state without detection.
Features:
No event can be removed or changed without detection (as long as one node is still runnning)
Can perform regular signed export of log for backup (mitigates damage of offline rollback)
Can send emails, run a script and/or kill the JVM if alterations are detected
Can use a CA-token (hard or soft) or a soft JKS keystore (stored encrypted with CA-key in database)
Can set a signature intensity to allow slower HSMs to use the feature
Nodes can be added or removed dynamically
Drawbacks:
It is good practise to
See conf/logdevices/propectedlog.properties.sample for more information on how to configure and use the device.
Reference manual
All configuration options, JNDI names etc is configured through the use of properties files in conf/*.properties file. You can copy the
.sample files to respective .properties files and configures. Most options are documented in the .samples files.
EJBCA have command line interfaces (cli) to both the CA and RA, and some other operations.
The best documentation for the cli can be found by running it.
bin/ejbca.sh bin/ejbca.sh ca bin/ejbca.sh ra this will give a list of all available cli commands. To find out which options are
available for a specific command, simply run the command with no options: bin/ejbca.sh ra adduser This will give documentation
about available options. To access the usage information for some commands, that does not take parameters, the option '-?' can
normally be provided.
Other Configuration
To setup an initial hard token issuer with alias 'local' and queue a superadmin user for card issuing. Card issuing using the hard
token issuers is normally done using PrimeCard.
This is a utility function to quickly and easily issue an initial administration smart card using PrimeCard.
If you want to change the baseurl of the admin-web after installation use the command:
To change ports (default public http=8080, public https=8442, private https=8443) you must edit conf/ejbca.properties. Change
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the properties httpserver.pubhttp, httpserver.pubhttps and httpserver.privhttps. After changing, run 'ant deploy' and re-start the
application server.
Asn1Dump
You can make an asn1 dump of a certificate in order to study the asn1 produced:
Certificates can be created batch-wise with EJBCA. The class org.ejbca.ui.cli.batch.BatchMakeP12 creates keystore files for all
users designated as NEW or FAILED in the local RA database. To be able to batch generate certificates, the users must be
registered with clear text passwords. To set a clear text password for a user use
The same is accomplished in the Admin-GUI by checking the checkbox 'Batch generation' when adding the user.
To generate keystore files for all users with status NEW or FAILED, run
bin/ejbca.sh batch
This will generate files for users if their clear text passwords are NOT null.
Without arguments 'batch' generates keystore files for all NEW or FAILED users. To generate a keystore file for a specific user,
enter command
Generated keystore files are stored in a subdirectory (to the current directory) called 'p12'. If the directory does not exist, it will
be created. Make sure this directory is WELL protected, since the information contained in keystore files are secret (private keys).
The format of keystores generated, PKCS12, JKS or PEM, is defined when adding the user in the database (using 'bin/ejbca.sh ra
adduser' or the admin-GUI).
Certificates and CRLs can be fetched through the public web-interface. They can also be fetched directly from the
'CertificateStoreSession' session bean or using the command 'bin/ejbca.sh ca getcrl'
EJBCA can be run with servlets and EJBs or only with EJBs. The servlets are only a publicly available front-end to the beans. If the
CA is deployed integrated in another J2EE application, this front-end may not be needed.
Customizing EJBCA
You can change any part of EJBCA to better suit your specific needs.
You can keep your personal modifications of EJBCA in a separate tree. Set the location of your personal modifications in
conf/custom.properties or use the default location '$EJBCA_HOME/../ejbca-custom'. Your modifications will automatically overwrite
any existing file(s) found in the EJBCA_HOME-directory or its subdirectories before executing an 'ant'-command. A sample,
conf/custom.properties.sample, is provided.
Example usage:
You have a working set of configuration files and database from the latest stable release, and want to try the latest trunk
snapshot.
You can now remove the entire $EJBCA_HOME-directory and replace it with the a fresh snapshot from the trunk. Restore the
database and all the config and generated keys will be restored to $EJBCA_HOME next time you run "ant deploy".
Please note that
there is no way to recover overwritten files, so you have to manually restore files if needed.
ant will not be able to detect if your changes are incompatible with newer versions of EJBCA. Always use 'diff' on the
different versions to see if any file you override is affected.
committing new features or improvements, that many would benefit from, is greatly appreciated by the community and
makes your maintenance easier
The public web-pages are written in JSP and can be found under src/publicweb/publicweb. Modify the pages (directly or by using a
separate tree), rebuild and redeploy. The changes should show on http://ejbcahost:8080/ejbca.
Adding your own rules to regulate the values of End Entity Fields
It is possible to define a set of rules to control the format of the End Entity fields. For example, it is possible to ensure that the
subject DN serial number is always a number of six digits, or should always end with the letter 'N'.
Setting such rules is done by implementing the static function org.ejbca.core.model.ra.FieldValidator.validate(). In this function,
you can define a rule that is applicable to a specific field in a specific End Entity profile. Should the field value not match the rule,
a CustomFieldException should be thrown and the error message you set in the exception will be shown as the error message in
the GUI. This rule will be checked each time an end entity is added or changed, whether is was added or changed by the GUI or
otherwise.
To avoid losing these rules when updating the EJBCA version, the new FieldValidator class should be stored in a ejbca-custom
catalog. Please see the "Handling changes in a separate tree" section above.
1. Find out the CA id of the CA you want to use for signing of the demo certificates. Use the admin-GUI or 'ejbca.sh ca listcas' to
find the integer value that is the CA id.
2. Configure the CA id in rc/java/org/ejbca/ui/web/pub/DemoCertReqServlet.java, it's the parameter DEFAULT_DEMOCAID.
3. Edit src/publicweb/publicweb/WEB-INF/web.xml and uncomment the two sections for the demo servlet.
4. If using UTF-8 to display the web-page containing the demo form to the users, change ISO-8859-1 to UTF-8 for the env-entry
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'contentEncoding'. Otherwise national characters in names will be encoded/displayed incorrectly in the certificates.
5. Deploy with 'ant deploy'.
6. Create an end entity profile and a certificate profile that should be used for the demo certificates.
7. Create a demo apply page containing something similar to the sample form below for Firefox. There are some sample scripts
under src/publicweb/publicweb.
You can use some hidden fields and some java script to for example only ask for a name, and concatenate it with a hidden partial DN
to produce a full dn for the 'user' parameter. Use your imagination!
Samples
A collection of samples are in the directory src/java/se/anatom/ejbca/samples.
Troubleshooting
Add Debug output from the console administration commands by replacing:
log4j.rootCategory=INFO, Console
log4j.rootCategory=DEBUG, Console
0. Set the baseurl of the server with the command 'setup.sh/cmd setbaseurl computername applicationpath' Set the BASEURL to
reflect your hostname, to be able to use the adminpages from external machines, this must be a real hostname or ip-address. Run
'ant deploy' to install the changes.
Edit the file so 'keyStorePass' is the same as the password you specify below for 'tomcat'.
3. Create a tomcat server keystore with the 'ejbca.sh batch' tool (this can also be done with Suns 'keytool' by creating a keystore and
then generating a certificate request that is processed by EJBCA, and last import the returned certificate and the CA-certificate into
the keystore).
bin/ejbca.sh ra adduser tomcat foo123 "C=SE,O=PrimeKey,CN=your-host-name" null caname null 1 JKS SERVER
7. Create a user for EJBCA admin with CN=SuperAdmin and the RAADMIN bit (temporarily CN=SuperAdmin gives admin rights).
Alternative: Create a PKCS12 file with EJBCA for a user with CN=SuperAdmin and the RAADMIN bit (temporarily CN=SuperAdmin
gives adminrights).
Alternative: Install the generated PKCS12 (p12/superadmin.p12) file in the browser. In Firefox this is done by
Edit->Preferences->Privacy&Security-> Certificates->Manage Certificates->Import In IE it is done by double-clicking on the .p12 file.
9. Start JBoss.
10. Go to https://hostname:8443/ejbca
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keytool -genkey -alias tomcat -keystore tomcat.jks -keyalg RSA -dname "C=SE,O=AnaTom,CN=hostname" -storepass foo123
keytool -certreq -alias tomcat -keystore tomcat.jks -sigalg SHA1WithRSA -storepass foo123 -file tomcat.req
bin/ejbca.sh ra adduser tomcat foo123 "C=SE,O=AnaTom,CN=hostname" null caname null 1 USERGENERATED SERVER
(go to EJBCA public web and get a 'Server certificate' by pasting the request into the web form and save as tomcat.pem)
bin/ejbca.sh ca getrootcert ca.der -der
keytool -import -trustcacerts -alias cacert -file ca.der -keystore tomcat.jks -storepass foo123
keytool -import -alias tomcat -file tomcat.pem -keystore tomcat.jks -storepass foo123
Character limitations
Since the Admin GUI still uses some JSP and EJBCA at some occasions uses string concatenation to build SQL querys, we have to
ban some characters to avoid XSS-attacks and SQL-injections:
\" \n \r \\ ; ! \0 % ` < > ? $ ~
(\n is newline, \r is carriage return, \\ is backslash, \0 is null)
Code signing
Being able to verify the integrity of a release or deployed EAR-archive might be required for some setups. Currently both ant targets
"ziprelease" and "ca.ear" (invoked from "deploy", "bootstrap" and the default target) supports jar-signing with the "jarsigner"
command included with Java. Note that you still could remove files from a signed archive without anyone noticing since the files are
signed individually. To create a signed ziprelease of EJBCA:
The certificate used for the signature must have key usage "Digital Signature" and extended key usage "Code Signing". The signed
archive can be verified using the "jarsigner" command and the CA-certificate. This example will output any unsigned file or file with a
bad signature:
jboss@server:~/ejbca$ jarsigner -verify -keystore p12/truststore.jks -verbose ../ejbca_x_y_z.zip | grep -v "^smk" | grep -v "
jar verified.
OpenSSL can be used to sign and verify an entire archive, but requires the public key from the signing certificate:
Copyright © 2001-2009 EJBCA team. All rights reserved. - Last Published: 06/17/2010 14:55:15
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