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Supported Certificate Formats

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Certificate Services can issue the following types of certificates.

Term Description
X.509 version 3 SSL-compatible client authentication certificate
 This client authentication certificate identifies a client and is used by servers to authenticate a client that requests server access.
X.509 v3 SSL-compatible server authentication certificate
 This server authentication certificate identifies a server and is used by clients to authenticate a server that the client wants to access.
S/MIME certificate
 This certificate is used by clients for secure email under the S/MIME (Secure/Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) protocol.

 

In addition to these certificates, Certificate Services can also be used to issue other X.509 certificates by writing a custom policy module.

Note

"Server authentication certificate" and "server certificate" as well as "client authentication certificate" and "client certificate" are interchangeable terms.

 

Additionally, Certificate Services includes certificate templates in the Microsoft enterprise certification authority configuration. Consult the Windows Help documentation for certificate templates to understand how they define certificate purposes.