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JS7 - Deployment of Scheduling Objects makes use of Signing Certificates to digitally sign workflows and other objects. Certificates are deployed to Controllers and Agents. Use of certificates for signing is not related to use of certificates to secure HTTPS connections, see JS7 - How to create X.509 SSL TLS Certificates.

Users can choose one of the following approachs specified with RFC5280:

• Self-issued Certificates are created individually per user and are deployed from individual certificate files to Controllers and Agents.
  • There is no security gap in use of self-issued Certificates. When users store certificate files to Controllers and Agents then this proves that they trust the certificates.
• Private CA-signed Certificates are issued by users who operate their own Private Certificate Authority (CA). Individual Signing Certficates on behalf of users are not deployed to Controllers and Agents. Instead, the CA Certificate is deployed that was used to sign individual Signing Certificates.
  • The approach includes that any Signing Certificate signed by the CA will be accepted for deployment of scheduling objects.
  • For better control which certificates are made available for deplyoment, users might decide to use a specific Private CA.
• Public CA-signed Certificates are issued by a trusted Certificate Authority (CA) that validates the domain owner. They are not created by users but are purchased from the trusted CA and therefore are not considered in the article.

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# Specify key name used for file names
key_name=signing

# Create Private Key and Certificate Signing Request
openssl req -new -newkey rsa:4096 -sha256 -nodes \
    -keyout ${key_name}.key \
    -out ${key_name}.csr \
    -subj "/C=DE/ST=Berlin/L=Berlin/O=SOS/OU=IT/CN=${key_name}"

@rem Specify key name used for file names
set key_name=signing
 
@rem Create Private Key and Certificate Signing Request
openssl req -new -newkey rsa:4096 -sha256 -nodes ^
    -keyout %key_name%.key ^
    -out %key_name%.csr ^
    -subj "/C=DE/ST=Berlin/L=Berlin/O=SOS/OU=IT/CN=%key_name%"

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Creating the Signing Certificate

Users can run the following commands from the shell and replace the value of the key_name environment variable with a name of their choice that is used when creating related files.

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Self-signed issued Certificates must be copied to the <data>/config/private/trusted-x509-keys directory of Controller and Agent instances.

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Creating CA-signed Certificates

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CA-signed Certificates

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creating_ca creating_ca

Setting up the Private CA

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The CA Certificate must be copied to the <data>/config/private/trusted-x509-keys directory of Controller and Agent instances.

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creating_signing_certificates creating_signing_certificates

Creating Signing Certificates

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The steps explained with this section are performed for each Signing Certificate created on behalf of a user.

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creating

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_signing_private_key creating_signing_private_key

Creating the

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Private

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Key and Certificate Signing Request

Steps include to create the signing.key Private Key file and signing.csr Certificate Signing Request file both in PEM format.

Users can run the following commands from the shell and replace the value of the key_name environment variable with a name of their choice that is used when creating related files.

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using_private_key_ecdsa using_private_key_ecdsa

Using ECDSA Encryption

# Specify key name used for file names
key_name=signing

# Create Private Key
openssl ecparam -genkey -name secp384r1 -out ${key_name}.key

# Create Certificate Signing Request
openssl req -new -sha512 -nodes \
    -key ${key_name}.key \
    -out ${key_name}.csr \
    -subj "/C=DE/ST=Berlin/L=Berlin/O=SOS/OU=IT/CN=${key_name}"

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@rem Specify key name used for file names
set key_name=signing-ca
 
@rem Create Private Key
openssl ecparam -genkey -name secp384r1 -out %key_name%.key
 
@rem Create Certificate Signing Request 
openssl req -new -sha512 -nodes ^
    -key %key_name%.key ^
    -out %key_name%.csr ^
    -subj "/C=DE/ST=Berlin/L=Berlin/O=SOS/OU=IT/CN=%key_name%"

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using_private_key_rsa using_private_key_rsa

Using RSA Encryption

# Specify key name used for file names
key_name=signing

# Create Private Key and Certificate Signing Request
openssl req -new -newkey rsa:4096 -sha256 -nodes \
    -keyout ${key_name}.key \
    -out ${key_name}.csr \
    -subj "/C=DE/ST=Berlin/L=Berlin/O=SOS/OU=IT/CN=${key_name}"

@rem Specify key name used for file names
set key_name=signing
 
@rem Create Private Key and Certificate Signing Request
openssl req -new -newkey rsa:4096 -sha256 -nodes ^
    -keyout %key_name%.key ^
    -out %key_name%.csr ^
    -subj "/C=DE/ST=Berlin/L=Berlin/O=SOS/OU=IT/CN=%key_name%"

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creating_signing_certificate creating_signing_certificate

Creating the Signing Certificate

Steps include to create the signing.crt Private CA-signed Certificate file in PEM format.

Users can run the following commands from the shell and replace the value of the key_name environment variable with a name of their choice that is used when creating related files:

# Specify key name used for file names
key_name=signing

# Create Certificate
openssl x509 -req -sha512 -days 3652 \
    -CA signing-ca.crt \
    -CAkey signing-ca.key \
    -CAcreateserial \
    -in ${key_name}.csr \
    -out ${key_name}.crt \
    -extfile <(printf '\nkeyUsage=critical,nonRepudiation,digitalSignature\nextendedKeyUsage=critical,codeSigning\n')

@rem Specify key name used for file names
set key_name=signing
 
@rem Create Certificate
set user_crt_tmp_file=user-crt-%RANDOM%.tmp
echo basicConstraints=CA:TRUE >> %user_crt_tmp_file%
echo keyUsage=critical,nonRepudiation,digitalSignature >> %user_crt_tmp_file%
echo extendedKeyUsage=critical,codeSigning >> %user_crt_tmp_file%

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Steps include to create the signing.crt Private CA-signed Certificate file in PEM format.

Users can run the following commands from the shell and replace the value of the key_name environment variable with a name of their choice that is used when creating related files:

openssl x509 -req -sha512 -days 3652 

^
    -CA signing-ca.crt 

^
    -CAkey signing-ca.key 

^
    -CAcreateserial

 ^
    -in %key_name%.csr ^
    -out 

%key_name%.crt 

^
    -

extfile %user_crt_tmp_file%

del /q %user_crt_tmp_file%

The Signing Certificate file does not require to be deployed to Controller and Agent instances. Instead, the CA Certificate file is deployed to Controller and Agent instances.

Further Resources

• JS7 - How to create X.509 SSL TLS Certificates