Certification authority
A trusted third party clearing house that issues digital certificates and digital signatures. Such certificates include an organization’s name, a serial number, an expiry date. In addition, to allow for the encryption and decryption of data, the public key of the organization is also included. Finally, the digital signature of the certificate-issuing authority is included so that a recipient can verify that the certificate is valid. The following companies provide various levels of certification services for organizations and individuals, like VeriSign, Entrust, Baltimore Technologies and Thawte.
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