Digital Certificate Manager (DCM)
Digital Certificate Manager allows you to manage digital certificates for your network and use Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) to enable secure communications for many applications.
A digital certificate is an electronic credential that you can use to establish proof of identity in an electronic transaction. There are an increasing number of uses for digital certificates to provide enhanced network security measures. For example, digital certificates are essential to configuring and using the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL). Using SSL allows you to create secure connections between users and server applications across an untrusted network, such as the Internet. SSL provides one of the best solutions for protecting the privacy of sensitive data, such as user names and passwords, over the Internet. Many System i™ platforms and applications, such as FTP, Telnet, HTTP Server provide SSL support to ensure data privacy.
System i provides extensive digital certificate support that allows you to use digital certificates as credentials in a number of security applications. In addition to using certificates to configure SSL, you can use them as credentials for client authentication in both SSL and virtual private network (VPN) transactions. Also, you can use digital certificates and their associated security keys to sign objects. Signing objects allows you to detect changes or possible tampering to object contents by verifying signatures on the objects to ensure their integrity.
Capitalizing on the System i support for certificates is easy when you use Digital Certificate Manager (DCM), a free feature, to centrally manage certificates for your applications. DCM allows you to manage certificates that you obtain from any Certificate Authority (CA). Also, you can use DCM to create and operate your own local CA to issue private certificates to applications and users in your organization.
Proper planning and evaluation are the keys to using certificates effectively for their added security benefits. You might review these topics to learn more about how certificates work and how you can use DCM to manage them and the applications that use them:
- What's new for V5R4
This information describes what information is new or significantly changed in this release.- Printable PDF
Use this page to learn how to print the entire topic as a PDF file.- DCM concepts
Before you start using digital certificates to enhance your system and network security policy, you need to understand what they are and what security benefits they provide.- DCM scenarios
These scenarios illustrate typical certificate implementation schemes to help you plan your own certificate implementation as part of your System i security policy. Each scenario also provides all needed configuration tasks perform to employ the scenario as described.- Planning for DCM
To use Digital Certificate Manager (DCM) to effectively manage your company's digital certificates, have an overall plan for how you will use digital certificates as part of your security policy.- Configuring DCM
Digital Certificate Manager (DCM) provides a browser-based user interface that you can use to manage and configure digital certificates for your applications and users. The user interface is divided into two main frames: a navigation frame and a task frame.- Managing DCM
After you configure Digital Certificate Manager (DCM), there are a number of certificate management tasks that you will need to perform over time.- Troubleshooting DCM
Review this information to learn how to resolve some of the more common errors that you may experience when using Digital Certificate Manager (DCM).- Related information for DCM
Review this page to find links to other resources for learning more about digital certificates, public key infrastructure, Digital Certificate Manager (DCM), and other related information.