Certificate Authority is a robust, private-trust CA solution designed for enterprises aiming to establish and maintain a secure, scalable, and efficient Public Key Infrastructure (PKI). Built-in with a n-tier PKI hierarchy, this on-premises CA provides seamless certificate issuance and management, ensuring full control over your organization's cryptographic ecosystem.

When deployed on Cryptographic Security Platform, this Entrust solution adds the following to the Base installation integration report.

Hardware secure modules supported by Certificate Authority

 See the following table for versions supported by Certificate Authority and other solutions.

Hardware

Client driver

Firmware

Certificate Authority

Timestamping Authority

Validation Authority

Entrust nShield Connect XC

13.9.0 (FIPS 140-2 Level 3 mode supported)

12.60.15 & 12.60.2

(tick) 

(tick) 

(tick) 

Entrust nShield 5c

13.9.0

13.2.4

(tick) 

(tick) 

(tick) 

Epicom

 EP990 v1.08-1

(error) 

(tick) 

(tick) 

Thales Luna HSM 7

10.8.0

7.7.1-20

(tick) 

(tick) 

(tick) 

Thales TCT

10.8.0

7.7.1-20

(error)  

(tick) 

(tick) 

General considerations:

  • You do not need to install the client drivers because the solution already includes this software. However, these client drivers cannot be updated.
  • You can only use 1/N card sets. A card set of, for example, 2/5 cards is not supported.
  • On high-availability installations with a cluster of several HSMs:

    • You cannot use HSMs from different providers simultaneously, meaning that nShield and Thales HSMs cannot coexist within the same deployment.
    • Entrust Validation Authority may experience the Thales TCT limitations described in the Thales TCT Universal Client Plugin Additional Information technical note dated May 28, 2025.
    • Solutions using the HSMs must be redeployed after any loss of connection with the HSMs, such as after an HSM reboot.

Key types supported by Certificate Authority

See the following table for the cryptosystem and hash algorithm combinations supported by Certificate Authority to sign certificates.

  • The available algorithms on this list depend on the configured cryptographic module.
  • For a testing environment with software cryptography, the list also includes the algorithms described in Post-quantum key types.

NIST will deprecate some algorithms after Dec 31, 2030. See https://nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/ir/2024/NIST.IR.8547.ipd.pdf

Label

Key algorithm

Signature algorithm

VA key type

VA signature algorithm

RSA-2048+PKCS15-SHA256

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

RSA-2048+PSS-SHA256

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAPSS

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAPSS

RSA-3072+PKCS15-SHA256

RSA3072

sha256WithRSAEncryption

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

RSA-3072+PSS-SHA256

RSA3072

sha256WithRSAPSS

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAPSS

RSA-4096+PKCS15-SHA512

RSA4096

sha512WithRSAEncryption

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

RSA-4096+PSS-SHA512

RSA4096

sha512WithRSAPSS

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAPSS

ECDSAP256+SHA256

ECDSAP256

ecdsa-with-SHA256

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

ECDSAP384+SHA384

ECDSAP384

ecdsa-with-SHA384

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

ECDSAP521+SHA512

ECDSAP521

ecdsa-with-SHA512

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

ML-DSA-44

ML-DSA-44

ML-DSA-44

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

ML-DSA-65

ML-DSA-65

ML-DSA-65

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

ML-DSA-87

ML-DSA-87

ML-DSA-87

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-128s-With-SHA256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-128s-With-SHA256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-128s-With-SHA256

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-128f-With-SHA256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-128f-With-SHA256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-128f-With-SHA256

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-192s-With-SHA512

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-192s-With-SHA512

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-192s-With-SHA512

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-192f-With-SHA512

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-192f-With-SHA512

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-192f-With-SHA512

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-256s-With-SHA512

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-256s-With-SHA512

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-256s-With-SHA512

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-256f-With-SHA512

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-256f-With-SHA512

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHA2-256f-With-SHA512

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-128s-With-SHAKE128

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-128s-With-SHAKE128

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-128s-With-SHAKE128

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-128f-With-SHAKE128

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-128f-With-SHAKE128

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-128f-With-SHAKE128

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-192s-With-SHAKE256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-192s-With-SHAKE256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-192s-With-SHAKE256

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-192f-With-SHAKE256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-192f-With-SHAKE256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-192f-With-SHAKE256

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-256s-With-SHAKE256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-256s-With-SHAKE256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-256s-With-SHAKE256

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-256f-With-SHAKE256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-256f-With-SHAKE256

Hash-SLH-DSA-SHAKE-256f-With-SHAKE256

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

SPHINCS+-SHA2-128f-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-128f-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-128f-simple

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

SPHINCS+-SHA2-128s-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-128s-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-128s-simple

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

SPHINCS+-SHA2-192f-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-192f-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-192f-simple

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

SPHINCS+-SHA2-192s-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-192s-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-192s-simple

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

SPHINCS+-SHA2-256f-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-256f-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-256f-simple

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

SPHINCS+-SHA2-256s-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-256s-simple

SPHINCS+-SHA2-256s-simple

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Falcon-512

Falcon-512

Falcon-512

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Falcon-1024

Falcon-1024

Falcon-1024

RSA2048

sha256WithRSAEncryption

Entrust products compatible with Certificate Authority

Certificate Authority for Cryptographic Security Platform 1.3 is compatible with the following Entrust products.

  • Certificate Manager included in Cryptographic Security Platform 1.3
  • Certificate Enrollment Gateway included in Cryptographic Security Platform 1.3

Database management systems supported by Certificate Authority

Certificate Authority supports the following Database Management Systems (DBMS).

DBMS

version

PostgreSQL

15+