CA(1)                       OpenSSL                       CA(1)





NAME
       ca - sample minimal CA application

SYNOPSIS
       openssl ca [-verbose] [-config filename] [-name section]
       [-gencrl] [-revoke file] [-crl_reason reason] [-crl_hold
       instruction] [-crl_compromise time] [-crl_CA_compromise
       time] [-subj arg] [-crldays days] [-crlhours hours]
       [-crlexts section] [-startdate date] [-enddate date]
       [-days arg] [-md arg] [-policy arg] [-keyfile arg] [-key
       arg] [-passin arg] [-cert file] [-in file] [-out file]
       [-notext] [-outdir dir] [-infiles] [-spkac file]
       [-ss_cert file] [-preserveDN] [-noemailDN] [-batch]
       [-msie_hack] [-extensions section] [-extfile section]
       [-engine id]

DESCRIPTION
       The ca command is a minimal CA application. It can be
       used to sign certificate requests in a variety of forms
       and generate CRLs it also maintains a text database of
       issued certificates and their status.

       The options descriptions will be divided into each pur-
       pose.

CA OPTIONS
       -config filename
           specifies the configuration file to use.

       -name section
           specifies the configuration file section to use
           (overrides default_ca in the ca section).

       -in filename
           an input filename containing a single certificate
           request to be signed by the CA.

       -ss_cert filename
           a single self signed certificate to be signed by the
           CA.

       -spkac filename
           a file containing a single Netscape signed public
           key and challenge and additional field values to be
           signed by the CA. See the SPKAC FORMAT section for
           information on the required format.

       -infiles
           if present this should be the last option, all sub-
           sequent arguments are assumed to the the names of
           files containing certificate requests.

       -out filename
           the output file to output certificates to. The
           default is standard output. The certificate details
           will also be printed out to this file.

       -outdir directory
           the directory to output certificates to. The cer-
           tificate will be written to a filename consisting of
           the serial number in hex with ".pem" appended.

       -cert
           the CA certificate file.

       -keyfile filename
           the private key to sign requests with.

       -key password
           the password used to encrypt the private key. Since
           on some systems the command line arguments are visi-
           ble (e.g. Unix with the 'ps' utility) this option
           should be used with caution.

       -passin arg
           the key password source. For more information about
           the format of arg see the PASS PHRASE ARGUMENTS sec-
           tion in openssl(1).

       -verbose
           this prints extra details about the operations being
           performed.

       -notext
           don't output the text form of a certificate to the
           output file.

       -startdate date
           this allows the start date to be explicitly set. The
           format of the date is YYMMDDHHMMSSZ (the same as an
           ASN1 UTCTime structure).

       -enddate date
           this allows the expiry date to be explicitly set.
           The format of the date is YYMMDDHHMMSSZ (the same as
           an ASN1 UTCTime structure).

       -days arg
           the number of days to certify the certificate for.

       -md alg
           the message digest to use. Possible values include
           md5, sha1 and mdc2.  This option also applies to
           CRLs.

       -policy arg
           this option defines the CA "policy" to use. This is
           a section in the configuration file which decides
           which fields should be mandatory or match the CA
           certificate. Check out the POLICY FORMAT section for
           more information.

       -msie_hack
           this is a legacy option to make ca work with very
           old versions of the IE certificate enrollment con-
           trol "certenr3". It used UniversalStrings for almost
           everything. Since the old control has various secu-
           rity bugs its use is strongly discouraged. The newer
           control "Xenroll" does not need this option.

       -preserveDN
           Normally the DN order of a certificate is the same
           as the order of the fields in the relevant policy
           section. When this option is set the order is the
           same as the request. This is largely for compatibil-
           ity with the older IE enrollment control which would
           only accept certificates if their DNs match the
           order of the request. This is not needed for Xen-
           roll.

       -noemailDN
           The DN of a certificate can contain the EMAIL field
           if present in the request DN, however it is good
           policy just having the e-mail set into the altName
           extension of the certificate. When this option is
           set the EMAIL field is removed from the certificate'
           subject and set only in the, eventually present,
           extensions. The email_in_dn keyword can be used in
           the configuration file to enable this behaviour.

       -batch
           this sets the batch mode. In this mode no questions
           will be asked and all certificates will be certified
           automatically.

       -extensions section
           the section of the configuration file containing
           certificate extensions to be added when a certifi-
           cate is issued (defaults to x509_extensions unless
           the -extfile option is used). If no extension sec-
           tion is present then, a V1 certificate is created.
           If the extension section is present (even if it is
           empty), then a V3 certificate is created.

       -extfile file
           an additional configuration file to read certificate
           extensions from (using the default section unless
           the -extensions option is also used).

       -engine id
           specifying an engine (by it's unique id string) will
           cause req to attempt to obtain a functional refer-
           ence to the specified engine, thus initialising it
           if needed. The engine will then be set as the
           default for all available algorithms.

CRL OPTIONS
       -gencrl
           this option generates a CRL based on information in
           the index file.

       -crldays num
           the number of days before the next CRL is due. That
           is the days from now to place in the CRL nextUpdate
           field.

       -crlhours num
           the number of hours before the next CRL is due.

       -revoke filename
           a filename containing a certificate to revoke.

       -crl_reason reason
           revocation reason, where reason is one of: unspeci-
           fied, keyCompromise, CACompromise, affiliation-
           Changed, superseded, cessationOfOperation, certifi-
           cateHold or removeFromCRL. The matching of reason is
           case insensitive. Setting any revocation reason will
           make the CRL v2.

           In practive removeFromCRL is not particularly useful
           because it is only used in delta CRLs which are not
           currently implemented.

       -crl_hold instruction
           This sets the CRL revocation reason code to certifi-
           cateHold and the hold instruction to instruction
           which must be an OID. Although any OID can be used
           only holdInstructionNone (the use of which is dis-
           couraged by RFC2459) holdInstructionCallIssuer or
           holdInstructionReject will normally be used.

       -crl_compromise time
           This sets the revocation reason to keyCompromise and
           the compromise time to time. time should be in Gen-
           eralizedTime format that is YYYYMMDDHHMMSSZ.

       -crl_CA_compromise time
           This is the same as crl_compromise except the revo-
           cation reason is set to CACompromise.

       -subj arg
           supersedes subject name given in the request.  The
           arg must be formatted as
           /type0=value0/type1=value1/type2=..., characters may
           be escaped by \ (backslash), no spaces are skipped.

       -crlexts section
           the section of the configuration file containing CRL
           extensions to include. If no CRL extension section
           is present then a V1 CRL is created, if the CRL
           extension section is present (even if it is empty)
           then a V2 CRL is created. The CRL extensions speci-
           fied are CRL extensions and not CRL entry exten-
           sions.  It should be noted that some software (for
           example Netscape) can't handle V2 CRLs.

CONFIGURATION FILE OPTIONS
       The section of the configuration file containing options
       for ca is found as follows: If the -name command line
       option is used, then it names the section to be used.
       Otherwise the section to be used must be named in the
       default_ca option of the ca section of the configuration
       file (or in the default section of the configuration
       file). Besides default_ca, the following options are
       read directly from the ca section:
        RANDFILE
        preserve
        msie_hack With the exception of RANDFILE, this is prob-
       ably a bug and may change in future releases.

       Many of the configuration file options are identical to
       command line options. Where the option is present in the
       configuration file and the command line the command line
       value is used. Where an option is described as mandatory
       then it must be present in the configuration file or the
       command line equivalent (if any) used.

       oid_file
           This specifies a file containing additional OBJECT
           IDENTIFIERS.  Each line of the file should consist
           of the numerical form of the object identifier fol-
           lowed by white space then the short name followed by
           white space and finally the long name.

       oid_section
           This specifies a section in the configuration file
           containing extra object identifiers. Each line
           should consist of the short name of the object iden-
           tifier followed by = and the numerical form. The
           short and long names are the same when this option
           is used.

       new_certs_dir
           the same as the -outdir command line option. It
           specifies the directory where new certificates will
           be placed. Mandatory.

       certificate
           the same as -cert. It gives the file containing the
           CA certificate. Mandatory.

       private_key
           same as the -keyfile option. The file containing the
           CA private key. Mandatory.

       RANDFILE
           a file used to read and write random number seed
           information, or an EGD socket (see RAND_egd(3)).

       default_days
           the same as the -days option. The number of days to
           certify a certificate for.

       default_startdate
           the same as the -startdate option. The start date to
           certify a certificate for. If not set the current
           time is used.

       default_enddate
           the same as the -enddate option. Either this option
           or default_days (or the command line equivalents)
           must be present.

       default_crl_hours default_crl_days
           the same as the -crlhours and the -crldays options.
           These will only be used if neither command line
           option is present. At least one of these must be
           present to generate a CRL.

       default_md
           the same as the -md option. The message digest to
           use. Mandatory.

       database
           the text database file to use. Mandatory. This file
           must be present though initially it will be empty.

       serial
           a text file containing the next serial number to use
           in hex. Mandatory.  This file must be present and
           contain a valid serial number.

       x509_extensions
           the same as -extensions.

       crl_extensions
           the same as -crlexts.

       preserve
           the same as -preserveDN

       email_in_dn
           the same as -noemailDN. If you want the EMAIL field
           to be removed from the DN of the certificate simply
           set this to 'no'. If not present the default is to
           allow for the EMAIL filed in the certificate's DN.

       msie_hack
           the same as -msie_hack

       policy
           the same as -policy. Mandatory. See the POLICY FOR-
           MAT section for more information.

       nameopt, certopt
           these options allow the format used to display the
           certificate details when asking the user to confirm
           signing. All the options supported by the x509 util-
           ities -nameopt and -certopt switches can be used
           here, except the no_signame and no_sigdump are per-
           manently set and cannot be disabled (this is because
           the certificate signature cannot be displayed
           because the certificate has not been signed at this
           point).

           For convenience the values ca_default are accepted
           by both to produce a reasonable output.

           If neither option is present the format used in ear-
           lier versions of OpenSSL is used. Use of the old
           format is strongly discouraged because it only dis-
           plays fields mentioned in the policy section, mis-
           handles multicharacter string types and does not
           display extensions.

       copy_extensions
           determines how extensions in certificate requests
           should be handled.  If set to none or this option is
           not present then extensions are ignored and not
           copied to the certificate. If set to copy then any
           extensions present in the request that are not
           already present are copied to the certificate. If
           set to copyall then all extensions in the request
           are copied to the certificate: if the extension is
           already present in the certificate it is deleted
           first. See the WARNINGS section before using this
           option.

           The main use of this option is to allow a certifi-
           cate request to supply values for certain extensions
           such as subjectAltName.

POLICY FORMAT
       The policy section consists of a set of variables corre-
       sponding to certificate DN fields. If the value is
       "match" then the field value must match the same field
       in the CA certificate. If the value is "supplied" then
       it must be present. If the value is "optional" then it
       may be present. Any fields not mentioned in the policy
       section are silently deleted, unless the -preserveDN
       option is set but this can be regarded more of a quirk
       than intended behaviour.

SPKAC FORMAT
       The input to the -spkac command line option is a
       Netscape signed public key and challenge. This will usu-
       ally come from the KEYGEN tag in an HTML form to create
       a new private key.  It is however possible to create
       SPKACs using the spkac utility.

       The file should contain the variable SPKAC set to the
       value of the SPKAC and also the required DN components
       as name value pairs.  If you need to include the same
       component twice then it can be preceded by a number and
       a '.'.

EXAMPLES
       Note: these examples assume that the ca directory struc-
       ture is already set up and the relevant files already
       exist. This usually involves creating a CA certificate
       and private key with req, a serial number file and an
       empty index file and placing them in the relevant direc-
       tories.

       To use the sample configuration file below the directo-
       ries demoCA, demoCA/private and demoCA/newcerts would be
       created. The CA certificate would be copied to
       demoCA/cacert.pem and its private key to demoCA/pri-
       vate/cakey.pem. A file demoCA/serial would be created
       containing for example "01" and the empty index file
       demoCA/index.txt.

       Sign a certificate request:

        openssl ca -in req.pem -out newcert.pem

       Sign a certificate request, using CA extensions:

        openssl ca -in req.pem -extensions v3_ca -out newcert.pem

       Generate a CRL

        openssl ca -gencrl -out crl.pem

       Sign several requests:

        openssl ca -infiles req1.pem req2.pem req3.pem

       Certify a Netscape SPKAC:

        openssl ca -spkac spkac.txt

       A sample SPKAC file (the SPKAC line has been truncated
       for clarity):

        SPKAC=MIG0MGAwXDANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAANLADBIAkEAn7PDhCeV/xIxUg8V70YRxK2A5
        CN=Steve Test
        emailAddress=steve@openssl.org
        0.OU=OpenSSL Group
        1.OU=Another Group

       A sample configuration file with the relevant sections
       for ca:

        [ ca ]
        default_ca      = CA_default            # The default ca section

        [ CA_default ]

        dir            = ./demoCA              # top dir
        database       = $dir/index.txt        # index file.
        new_certs_dir  = $dir/newcerts         # new certs dir

        certificate    = $dir/cacert.pem       # The CA cert
        serial         = $dir/serial           # serial no file
        private_key    = $dir/private/cakey.pem# CA private key
        RANDFILE       = $dir/private/.rand    # random number file

        default_days   = 365                   # how long to certify for
        default_crl_days= 30                   # how long before next CRL
        default_md     = md5                   # md to use

        policy         = policy_any            # default policy
        email_in_dn    = no                    # Don't add the email into cert DN

        nameopt        = ca_default            # Subject name display option
        certopt        = ca_default            # Certificate display option
        copy_extensions = none                 # Don't copy extensions from request

        [ policy_any ]
        countryName            = supplied
        stateOrProvinceName    = optional
        organizationName       = optional
        organizationalUnitName = optional
        commonName             = supplied
        emailAddress           = optional

FILES
       Note: the location of all files can change either by
       compile time options, configuration file entries, envi-
       ronment variables or command line options.  The values
       below reflect the default values.

        /usr/local/ssl/lib/openssl.cnf - master configuration file
        ./demoCA                       - main CA directory
        ./demoCA/cacert.pem            - CA certificate
        ./demoCA/private/cakey.pem     - CA private key
        ./demoCA/serial                - CA serial number file
        ./demoCA/serial.old            - CA serial number backup file
        ./demoCA/index.txt             - CA text database file
        ./demoCA/index.txt.old         - CA text database backup file
        ./demoCA/certs                 - certificate output file
        ./demoCA/.rnd                  - CA random seed information

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
       OPENSSL_CONF reflects the location of master configura-
       tion file it can be overridden by the -config command
       line option.

RESTRICTIONS
       The text database index file is a critical part of the
       process and if corrupted it can be difficult to fix. It
       is theoretically possible to rebuild the index file from
       all the issued certificates and a current CRL: however
       there is no option to do this.

       V2 CRL features like delta CRL support and CRL numbers
       are not currently supported.

       Although several requests can be input and handled at
       once it is only possible to include one SPKAC or self
       signed certificate.

BUGS
       The use of an in memory text database can cause problems
       when large numbers of certificates are present because,
       as the name implies the database has to be kept in mem-
       ory.

       It is not possible to certify two certificates with the
       same DN: this is a side effect of how the text database
       is indexed and it cannot easily be fixed without intro-
       ducing other problems. Some S/MIME clients can use two
       certificates with the same DN for separate signing and
       encryption keys.

       The ca command really needs rewriting or the required
       functionality exposed at either a command or interface
       level so a more friendly utility (perl script or GUI)
       can handle things properly. The scripts CA.sh and CA.pl
       help a little but not very much.

       Any fields in a request that are not present in a policy
       are silently deleted. This does not happen if the -pre-
       serveDN option is used. To enforce the absence of the
       EMAIL field within the DN, as suggested by RFCs, regard-
       less the contents of the request' subject the -noemailDN
       option can be used. The behaviour should be more
       friendly and configurable.

       Cancelling some commands by refusing to certify a cer-
       tificate can create an empty file.

WARNINGS
       The ca command is quirky and at times downright un-
       friendly.

       The ca utility was originally meant as an example of how
       to do things in a CA. It was not supposed to be used as
       a full blown CA itself: nevertheless some people are
       using it for this purpose.

       The ca command is effectively a single user command: no
       locking is done on the various files and attempts to run
       more than one ca command on the same database can have
       unpredictable results.

       The copy_extensions option should be used with caution.
       If care is not taken then it can be a security risk. For
       example if a certificate request contains a basic-
       Constraints extension with CA:TRUE and the copy_exten-
       sions value is set to copyall and the user does not spot
       this when the certificate is displayed then this will
       hand the requestor a valid CA certificate.

       This situation can be avoided by setting copy_extensions
       to copy and including basicConstraints with CA:FALSE in
       the configuration file.  Then if the request contains a
       basicConstraints extension it will be ignored.

       It is advisable to also include values for other exten-
       sions such as keyUsage to prevent a request supplying
       its own values.

       Additional restrictions can be placed on the CA certifi-
       cate itself.  For example if the CA certificate has:

        basicConstraints = CA:TRUE, pathlen:0

       then even if a certificate is issued with CA:TRUE it
       will not be valid.

SEE ALSO
       req(1), spkac(1), x509(1), CA.pl(1), config(5)



0.9.7c                     2003-07-03                     CA(1)
