ABSTRACT

Some of the companies in the public key infrastructure

(PKI) business provide all services: hosting Certificate and

Registration Authorities (CAs and RAs); registering sub-

scribers; issuing, publishing, and maintaining the current

status of all types of certificates; and supporting a network

of trust. Other companies sell their extraordinarily powerful

software, which includes CAs, RAs, gateways, connectors,

toolkits, etc. These components allow buyers (clients) to

build their own PKIs to meet their business needs. In all

the scenarios, the processes for registration of PKI subscri-

bers may be very different.