Can anyone recommend a client ssl-certificates service? [closed]

Question

I'm looking through a variety of SSL providers, but they all seem to provide "email certificates" which can double as client-certs that can be installed into a browser.

Does any company actually sell client-certificates and know what they're talking about?

Answer 1

X509v3 certificates can be restricted to specific uses. Some S/MIME certificates are restricted so that they can't be used for websites, but most are not.

Thawte no longer issues client certificates. My certificate from 2003 had a Cert Type" of "SSL CLient, S/MIME" indicating that they could be used for both email and for client certificates. My certificate from April 27, 2009 had only a single constraint, that it could not be used as a Certificate Authority.

Apple's iChat encryption certificate can only be used for SSL Client. You get this automatically if you are a me.com customer and enable secure iChat.

You may find that it is easiest to issue your own certificates. Many people do this and it works quite well. You will need to have the user load your own key as a CA.