TLS Certificate Rollback Schedule for Pinned Client Devices
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Solution Overview
Problem
The expiration of digital TLS certificates leads to service interruptions and potential loss of business due to client devices rejecting new certificates pinned with outdated information, causing a significant drop in traffic before the issue can be rectified.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a TLS certificate rollback schedule with successive time windows, where the network service alternates between using new and previous certificates, gradually increasing the use of new certificates to alert administrators and mitigate rejections, allowing for a smooth transition to the new certificate without prior pinning modifications.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a new TLS certificate is issued and deployed immediately, then security is improved by preventing expired certificate issues, but service availability deteriorates due to client devices with pinned certificates rejecting the new certificate
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the certificate deployment process into multiple time windows, where each window presents a different certificate (new or old) to clients. This segmentation allows the system to gradually transition from the old certificate to the new certificate, preventing complete service disruption while achieving eventual certificate renewal.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements dynamic certificate presentation by randomly selecting between the new and old certificates within each time window, and by adjusting the proportion of new certificate usage over successive windows. This dynamic approach allows the system to adapt to client behavior and gradually increase new certificate adoption without causing immediate service failure.
2Reliability
If certificate pinning is enforced strictly on client devices, then security is improved by ensuring only known certificates are accepted, but adaptability deteriorates when certificates need to be renewed
Solution Approach 1:
The patent prepares multiple certificates in advance (both the current valid certificate and the new certificate) before the transition begins. By having the new certificate ready and tested beforehand, the system can smoothly transition without service interruption, resolving the conflict between strict verification and renewal capability.
Data Source
AI summary
The present disclosure generally relates to systems and methods for the gradual application of a new digital certificate to a service endpoint or server, with repeated rollbacks to an old digital certificate, whereby the new certificate is applied to a service endpoint and automatically rolled back to the previous certificate after an amount of time. After a period that corresponds to a set amount of time minus the time the new certificate was applied to the endpoint, the process starts again, except with an increased period of time for the new certificate.