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Security Fundamentals & Crypto · Foundational

Intermediate Certificate Authority

A subordinate CA whose certificate is signed by a root or another intermediate and that issues end-entity certificates.

Definition

Intermediate CAs protect the root by taking on day-to-day issuance. If an intermediate is compromised, it can be revoked without replacing the root. Servers must send the intermediate certificates in the chain so clients can build a path to a trusted root.

Example

A web server missing its intermediate certificate causes 'unable to get local issuer certificate' errors on some clients.

Exam tip

Chain errors are often caused by a server not presenting its intermediate certificate.

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