ACME

The Automatic Certificate Management Environment (or ACME for short) Protocol is used to enable the automatic enrolment of certificates for webservers. It allows a client to request certificates using signed JSON messages sent over HTTPS. The ACME server will verify that the client owns the requested domains by using either a HTTP or DNS based challenge.

Several free and open-source ACME clients exist. The most popular of which, Certbot, can be configured to automatically install and renew certificates for Apache, Nginx, and other webservers.

The next generation of Certificate Automation

ACME+ is a Cogito Group extension to the ACME protocol which allows issuance of different types of Certificates, whereas the standard protocol is limited to certificates for webservers.

When operating in ACME+ mode, the server can be configured to use other forms of trust and validation rather than relying on a certificate’s identifiers that must be based on a DNS name in the event one is not available. This mode is intended to allow for the automated issuance of certificates using convenient and familiar tools.

Functionality of ACME+

• adds the ability to use the ACME protocol as a basis for certificate types other than TLS certificates
• allows for domain validation to be turned off where required.
• replaces our existing “store and forward” capability with a standard protocol approach:
  • this is where a certificate is requested and delivered through a store and forward
    mechanism for disconnected domains.
  • this allows domains that are disconnected from a CA to still automate requests.
• will store automated requests for transfer to another network where the CA resides.
  • It enables requests to be automatically bulk submitted and returned for transfer back to the originating disconnected network.
  • The requests can then be automatically picked up by the clients that have requested

Download our ACME Fact Sheet below

Related
Check out our related content below:

• Certificate Automation
• API
• SCEP
• AEX