Proxy System for Certificate Request Interception and Validation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Certificate Authorities face challenges in detecting and preventing mis-issued digital certificates, which can lead to security issues due to lack of public scrutiny and potential malicious activities, as these errors may remain undetected for a long time, allowing attackers to exploit them.
Innovation Solution
A proxy system intercepts certificate requests and transmitted certificates, using a workflow engine to run checks based on the certificate contents, requester, and system providing the request or certificate, denying problematic requests, providing warnings, and logging information for audit purposes, ensuring accountability and compliance.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If Certificate Authorities keep their internal CA systems and processes confidential and secret, then security protection is improved, but detection of problematic certificate issuance becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a proxy system as an intermediary between the public and the confidential CA internal systems. This proxy system can scrutinize certificate issuance processes without exposing the internal confidential systems, thereby maintaining security while enabling detection of problematic certificates.
Solution Approach 2:
The proxy system performs preliminary checks and validations on certificate requests before they are processed by the internal CA systems. This allows potential issues to be detected early in the process while the internal systems remain protected and confidential.
2Productivity
If Certificate Authorities issue certificates without public scrutiny, then issuance speed is improved, but mis-issued certificates remain undetected for long periods
Solution Approach 1:
The proxy system acts as a mediator that can validate certificates without significantly slowing down the issuance process. It performs automated checks that are much faster than manual public scrutiny while maintaining high accuracy in detecting mis-issued certificates.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent replaces manual public scrutiny with automated computational validation performed by the proxy system. This substitution maintains high issuance speed while improving detection accuracy through systematic automated checks rather than slow manual processes.
3Difficulty of detecting and measuring
If a proxy system is introduced to intercept and evaluate certificate requests, then detection capability is improved, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The proxy system is designed as a separate, modular component that can be added to existing CA infrastructure without restructuring the entire system. This segmentation allows the detection functionality to be implemented independently, reducing the complexity burden on the overall system.
Solution Approach 2:
By positioning the proxy system as an intermediary layer, the patent avoids the need to modify internal CA systems. The proxy handles all detection and validation functions externally, preventing complexity from propagating into the core confidential systems while still achieving comprehensive detection capability.
Data Source
AI summary
The invention discloses a system and apparatus for detecting problematic certificate action requests and digital certificates. Ideally, the invention will be used to detect a certificate request that will result in security problems and detect issued certificates that lack essential information. The invention uses a proxy system that intercepts certificate requests and transmitted certificates. The proxy system runs a series of checks on the intercepted request and/or certificate. The checks vary depending on the certificate contents, requester, and system providing the request or certificate.