Certificate Token for Digital Certificate Provisioning

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Solution Overview

Problem

The existing process of obtaining digital certificates is inefficient, requiring users to undergo significant effort and limiting their freedom in choosing a certification service provider, as they need to repeatedly identify themselves and provide personal data during certificate renewal or changes.

Innovation Solution

A certificate token with a request data record containing signed personal data and a public certificate key is used to transmit a digital certificate to an electronic certification service via a communication network, allowing the digital certificate to be verified and stored without requiring user re-identification, enabling efficient digital certificate provision using any certification service.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If the user re-identifies themselves and provides personal data through the certification service provider for certificate renewal or changes, then the digital certificate can be reissued, but the user and provider incur high costs and the user's freedom of choice is restricted

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvecertificate authenticityVSAvoidcertificate provision process
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSEase of operation

Solution Approach 1:

The patent applies preliminary action by storing the signed personal data and public key in advance within the certificate token during initial user identification. This pre-stored request data enables subsequent certificate operations without requiring repeated user identification, thus reducing costs and increasing freedom of choice while maintaining certificate authenticity through the pre-verified signed data.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #10Preliminary action

2Productivity

If the user re-identifies themselves for certificate renewal, then a new digital certificate can be generated, but the process becomes time-consuming and costly

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvecertificate issuance efficiencyVSAvoiduser identification time
Core Design Contradiction:
ProductivityVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

The patent implements preliminary action by performing user identification and signing personal data once during initial token setup. The signed personal data and public key are stored in the certificate token for future use, eliminating the need for repeated identification processes during certificate renewal or changes, thereby significantly reducing time loss and improving certificate issuance efficiency.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The patent uses copying by storing a copy of the signed personal data and public key within the certificate token. This copied request data can be transmitted to different certification service providers without requiring the original identification process, enabling efficient certificate operations across multiple providers while maintaining security through the cryptographic signatures.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #26Copying

3Adaptability or versatility

If personal data is transmitted to the certification service provider for each certificate operation, then the certificate can be issued, but the process becomes complex and restrictive

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvecertification service provider selectionVSAvoidcertificate provision system
Core Design Contradiction:
Adaptability or versatilityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The patent extracts the personal data and public key from the certification service provider system and stores them within the certificate token itself. This extraction allows the token to operate independently of any specific provider, enabling users to choose different certification service providers without system complexity or data transmission requirements, thus improving adaptability while simplifying the overall process.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #2Taking out (Extraction)

Solution Approach 2:

The certificate token acts as an intermediary that contains the signed personal data and public key. Instead of directly transmitting personal data between users and certification service providers for each operation, the token serves as a self-contained mediator that provides the necessary authentication data, reducing system complexity and enabling flexible provider selection.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #24Intermediary (Mediator)

Data Source

PatentEP3248356B1Certificate token for providing a digital certificate of a user
Publication Date: 2020.06.03 BUNDESDRUCKEREI GMBH
  • EP3248356B1 patent drawingFigure 1
  • EP3248356B1 patent drawingFigure 2
  • EP3248356B1 patent drawingFigure 3

AI summary

The invention relates to a certificate token (100) for providing a digital certificate of a user, comprising a memory (101) which includes a request data record for transmission of the digital certificate of a user, said request data record comprising a signed personal datum of the user and a public certificate key for the digital certificate, and a communication interface (103) which is designed to provide the request data record for transmission to an electronic certification service via a communication network, and to receive the digital certificate of the user from the electronic certification service to provide the digital certificate.