The X.509 Certificate Quality

The growing number of PKIs (Public Key Infrastructure) and the increasing number of situations where partners of a transaction may carry certificates signed by different CAs (Certification Authority) point out the problematic of trust between the different CAs. The degree to which a relying party can trust a CA depends upon the quality of its announced policy and its commitment to this policy. In this paper, the authors present an approach that helps a relying party to assess the quality of a certificate that is related to the quality of CA policy and its commitment to it. They integrate the role of relying party in the evaluation process.