A Practical Approach for Implementation of Public Key Infrastructure for Digital Signatures

Abstract

In an organization with its own Private Network , it is not just enough to transfer the documents from one person to another, but also it needs to ensure that the document retains its integrity, confirms the authenticity of the sender, provides privacy, if required and it is safe against repudiations. To address these, it is proposed to establish a public key infrastructure (PKI) for digital signatures with in the organizations. Public key infrastructure provides robust and rigorous security measures to protect user data and credentials. In this paper, it is proposed that documents are digitally signed on before being sent as an authentication measure. The trust between two parties and digital signatures are reinforced by components of public key infrastructure (PKI) namely Public Key Cryptography, Certificate Authority (CA), Certificates, Certificate Repository (CR), and also a simple application to demonstrate the same would also be attempted.

Keywords: Open SSL, Public Key Infrastructure, Digital signatures, Certificate Authority, Certificate Repository.