Public Key Certificates are electronic documents used to provide identification by using a digital signature and binding it to a public key. In order to properly identify a person or resource using a certificate, they must be validated against an issuing Certificate Authority (CA). Most Web browsers and other Internet applications hold trust lists for the most common Certificates Authorities on the Internet.
All new personal and server electronic certificates used at the University of Cincinnati are issued through InCommon, a federation organized to provide trust frameworks and standards in order to share resources between education and research institutions in the United States. Implementation of InCommon certificates allows for consistent issuance, revocation, and management of the certificates and ensures that all certificates are of the same standard. There is no per unit charge for use of these certificates by UC staff, faculty and systems as the certificates are deployed as part of our enterprise license agreement with InCommon.