MustGather information for Certificate problems

Other useful information

The documentation required to diagnose problems with Certificates includes

  1. Diagnostic steps to take before reproducing

    Known issues to check first

  2. Known IHS problems at startup or request processing issues to check first

  3. Other known issues

    Certificate FAQs


    Unable to start Ikeyman

    GSKit v5 Ikeyman doesn't start in Windows 2003

    On Windows 2003, Ikeyman requires setting of the "Application Compatibility" flag:
    1. Right click in the Ikeyman icon and select "Properties"
    2. On the properties dialog select the "Compatibility" tab
    3. In the "Compatibility mode" section of this tab tick the "Run this program 
    in compatibility mode for:" check box.
    4. Select "Windows 95" from the resultant list box.
    5. Press "OK" on the "Properties" dialog box
    6. Run Ikeyman as normal
    

    Ikeyman fails to load / crashes on PPC Linux

    Solution: Ensure a 32-bit JRE is being used

    Ikeyman displays with blank window controls on Windows XP

    Note: Windows XP is not supported as a production system - only with limited support as a development system.

    If you try to use Ikeyman on Windows XP and the window is displaying with blank controls, then you may be able to solve it using one of the following:

    Possible Solution 1:
    (Ikeyman must be invoked from the Start menu for this to help. It won't help for invoking the ikeyman.bat from a command-prompt.)

    1. Locate Ikeyman in the Start menu
       ('All Programs -> IBM HTTP Server V6.1 -> Start Key Management Utility')            
    2. Right-click this entry and select "Properties"
    3. On the properties dialog select the "Compatibility" tab
    4. In the "Compatibility mode" section of this tab tick the 
       "Run this program in compatibility mode for:" check box.
    5. Select "Windows 2000" from the resultant list box.
    6. Press "OK" on the "Properties" dialog box
    7. Run Ikeyman as normal
          

    Possible Solution 2:

    There is also reported success with solving this by disabling DirectX features per:
    http://bugs.sun.com/bugdatabase/view_bug.do?bug_id=6311320

    Can't receive certificate in Ikeyman: All the signer certificates must exist in the key database

    To receive a certificate, your KeyFile must be able to validate the new certificate all the way up to a trusted root in the signer certificate section of the KDB.

    If your certificate was issued by a certificate authority that is not among the default trusted certificate authorities automatically included in new KDB files by ikeyman, you must add the certificate of the issuer (the signer) to your KDB before receiving your certificate

    Adding the signer certificate

    1. Download the Signer Certificate from your certificate authority
    2. Open your KDB, click "Signer Certificate", then "add".
    3. Enter a label and click "OK"
    4. Open the signer cert you just created, and check that the "Set the certificate as a trusted root" is checked

    If ikeyman still issues the same error message when you try to receive your certificate, use the following procedure to verify that the signer certificate is the same as the one that actually signed your certificate

    openssl x509 -text -in certificate_from_certificateauthority.crt|grep Issuer:
    openssl x509 -text -in signer_certificate.cer |grep Subject:
    If the output of the two commands isn't the same distinguished name, you are either using the wrong signer certificate or your certificate is signed using an intermediate certificate.

    Intermediate Certificates

    Some certificate authorities issue certificates that are signed by an intermediate issuer, and not one of the default trusted root CA certificates that are pre-loaded into your KDB. Your certificate authority should provide any intermediate certificates required to build the trust chain and you must add them to your KDB before receiving your signed certificate.

    Solution: To add the correct intermediate certificate(s), download all intermediate certificates from your certificate authority. Perform the steps outlined here for each certificate starting from the root CA and ending with the signer certificate that issued your certificate.

    Subject/Authority key identifier mismatch (Microsoft CA)

    If the certificate you are trying to receive or add contains an Authority Key Identifier (AKI), the issuer of this certificate in your KDB must have a Subject Key Identifier (SKI) with the same value.

    The AKI/SKI can be an arbitrary binary value, or a combination of the issuers DN and Serial Number.

    Both intermediate and end-entity certificates may contain an AKI.

    openssl x509 -in intermediate.crt -text|grep -C1 "X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:" && openssl x509 -in root.crt -text|grep -C1 "X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:"
     
                    X509v3 Authority Key Identifier:
                    keyid:7B:58:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
    
                    X509v3 Subject Key Identifier:
                    keyid:4A:D3:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
      
    

    Solution: Contact certificate authority for the proper version (possible Serial Number bump) of the issuer certificate with the matching SKI.

    Ikeyman: An error occurred while inserting keys to the database

    Solution: This can occur when importing from a PKCS12 or CMS key file, onto a CMS Cryptographic Token. It is resolved by upgrading GSKit to at least 7.0.3.27 and removing gskikm.jar.

    If upgrading and removing gskikm.jar does not resolve the issue, adding the private key and signer certificates in separate steps can sometimes workaround the issue:

    1. Verify your unrestricted JCE policy files are installed
    2. Make a copy of the PKCS12 file, privkey.p12, and open the copy in ikeyman.
    3. Select "Signer Certificates" and "extract" each signer certificate necessary for your personal certificate into a file.
    4. Remove each signer certificate from the PKCS12 file.
    5. Close the PKCS12 file.
    6. Open the CMS Cryptographic Token in ikeyman and choose the applicable secondary CMS key database.
    7. Select "Signer Certificates" and "add" each extracted signer certificate.
    8. Select "Personal Certificates" and "import" from your privkey.p12

    Ikeyman: Certificate Request Not Found

    Certificates can only be received into the KDB where the request was originally created. Attempting to duplicate the parameters of a previously submitted certificate request in a new KDB will not allow you to receive the certificate in the new KDB..

    Solution: Receive certificate into the KDB that made original request or resubmit certificate request.

    Ikeyman widgets perform unexpectedly

    It has been reported that ikeyman sometimes performs erratically when it is displayed on the PC X11 Server distributed by Exceed. The behavior is not seen when used with XFree86/Xorg X11 servers running natively or under Cygwin, and is also not seen when being run in a VNC server running on the IHS system.

    Reported Symptom: When selecting a country name from the selection box, the select box may be reset to default (US)

    Solution: Display ikeyman on a different X11 server, or contact X11 server vendor.

    Ikeyman: Wrong version reported in "About" dialogue

    In IHS 7.0 and earlier, the bundled java's gskikm.jar provides a different level of Ikeyman than what's bundled with GSKit. This can cause differences in the version numbers reported between the java-based certificate management tools and the native GSKit and IHS runtimes.

    In IHS 6.1 and earlier, a manual post-install configuration step is required to setup IHS to use the proper (up to date) certificate management implementation. See #GSKIKM for instructions.

    In IHS 7.0, leaving gskikm.jar in place causes a more up to date Ikeyman and gsk7cmd to be used (v8). To revert to the legacy Ikeyman 7.0 with IHS 7.0, see #GSKIKM.

    Ikeyman 8.0 in IHS 7.0

    • Ikeyman 8.0 is used in IHS 7.0 when $IHSROOT/java/jre/lib/ext/gskikm.jar is present.
    • When IHS 7.0 has been setup to use Ikeyman 8.0 as described above, $IHSROOT/bin/gsk7cmd also uses the updated codebase.
    • With IHS 7.0, only Ikeyman 8.0 is supported on Solaris or HP-UX.
    • Authoritative documentation for Ikeyman 8.0 is available here
    • Information on the PKCS11 configuration used by Ikeyman v8 in IHS 7.0 is available here

    removing gskikm.jar to use GSKit-provided Ikeyman

    A file provided by the IBM JRE, gskikm.jar, can override the version of Ikeyman, which would otherwise be dictated by the level of GSKit maintenance applied alongside IHS.

    Solution: Ensure the JVM being used to run Ikeyman does not have a file named gskikm.jar under $JAVA_HOME/jre/lib/ext/. If this file exists move it into a different directory (changing the filename alone is not sufficient).

  4. IHS runtime reports wrong GSKit level

    On windows, a stray gsk7*.dll in the C:\Windows\system32 can cause IHS to report (and use) the wrong GSKit level at startup. No GSKit files should be present in this directory.

  5. Ikeyman: Can't create CMS key database, error loading native CMS library

    New private key only has 1023 bits instead of 1024 (or 2047 bits instead of 2048)

    A defect in older levels of Java causes ikeyman to create new certificates with a 1023 bit private key instead of a 1024 private bit key.

    If the procedure in the following technote has been followed to enable 2048 bit keys for v6.0, then this same problem can cause the key to be 2047 bit insetad of 2048:
    The iKeyman utility within IBM HTTP Server V6.0 does not provide the option to create a certificate request (CSR) 2048 key size

    Solutions:

    Error received during import/receive: "Error processing X509 certificate"

    This error is typically seen in Ikeyman when one or more X509 extensions present in the certificate are malformed. Some common errors follow.

    If your certificate is part of an existing key database, you can extract the certificate with the following command. Otherwise, you can analyze your certificate directly.

    gsk7cmd -cert -extract -label label -db key.kdb -pw abc123 -format ascii -target cert.arm

    Causes:

    Issuer does not exist in secondary key database while using cryptographic accelerator

    When cryptographic hardware is in use, iKeyman will sometimes report "Error processing X509 certificate" instead of "All the signer certificates must exist in the key database" when the issuer of a certificate you're receiving is not present in your secondary key file.

    Verify the issuer of the certificate you're trying to receive exists in the "Signer Certificates" section in iKeyman

    If you're using an intermediate certificate (your server certificate isn't signed by one of a browser's default trusted root certificate authorities but is signed by an issuer who is in turn signed by a trusted CA), web browsers can improperly cache expired copies of the intermediate certificates. This can occur if in the past the user has clicked 'Trust site permanently' on a site that uses the same intermediate certificate authority.

    Solution: Remove the expired cached copy of the intermediate certificate from the browser's SSL configuration.

    Client Authentication is enabled but browser doesn't prompt for certificate

    During the SSL handshake, the web server informs the browser of what Certificate Authorities it trusts to assist the browser in selecting the correct client certificate. If the browser detects that none of the user's client certificates would be validated given the list of certificate authorities sent by the server, the browser will NOT prompt the user for a certificate.

    If a subset of the user's client certificates can be validated by the servers list of certificate authorities, the browser will display that partial list of certificates to the user.

    Solution: The issuer of the client certificates must be added as a trusted Certificate Authority in the servers KeyFile.

    Ikeyman: The specified database has been corrupted (Strong Encryption).

    Often PKCS12 files (or other Key Databases) use strong encryption that is not available in the default JCE policy files provided by java.

    To test if the cryptography level in your PKCS12 file exceeds the JCE defaults, use the keytool command supplied in your JRE:

    keytool -list -v -keystore /tmp/your.p12 -storetype pkcs12 -storepass password

            ... Unsupported keysize or algorithm parameters
    
    Solution: Install the appropriate JCE policy files for your JRE:
    Java 5 on all platforms, or Java 1.4.2 on AIX, Linux, Windows IBM unrestricted JCE policy files

    Java 1.4.2 on HPUX, Solaris: Sun unrestricted JCE policy files

    Continue on for another common cause of this error message

    Ikeyman: The specified database has been corrupted

    Outside of PCKS12 keystores, the most common cause of this message is using an incorrect password. If IHS can service SSL requests (even if clients terminate the handshake due to an expired individual certificate) with the KDB, that means the KDB is not corrupt and the password being provided does not matched the stashed password.

    gsk7cmd reports: "Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: com/ibm/asn1/ASN1Exception"

    Solution: Rename $JAVA_HOME/lib/ext/gskikm.jar to $JAVA_HOME/lib/ext/gskikm.bak as described here

    erroneously reported "A duplicate certificate already exists in the database"

    If you cannot add a CA certificate using ikeyman, and you're sure it's not actually a duplicate, try adding the CA with gsk7capicmd to check if a different error code is issued.

    gsk7capicmd -cert -add -db key.kdb -pw YOURPASSWORD -file your_issuer.arm -label myca

    If the error reported by gsk7capicmd is GSKKM_ERR_VALIDATION_KEY_SIGNATURE, and you're using GSKit 7.0.4.1 or higher, see DER encoding error below.

    Certificate validation failures with GSKit 7.0.4.1 and higher

    When validating a certificate, GSKit versions 7.0.3.22 and higher first converts the certificate to a BER encoding, the most detailed encoding of the certificate, and then into the ubiquitous DER form. CA issuers calculate certificate signatures over the DER encoding. GSKit always sends this calculated DER-encoding of the certificate to the client.

    The DER specification dictates that default values must not be present in the DER-encoded representation. If a certificate uses an illegally constructed DER, or if the certificate authority has signed either the BER-encoded form or a malformed DER-encoded form, the following may occur:

    Any extension in a certificate may contain an element of a sequence with a default value. If a DER-encoded certificate contains such default values explicitly listed in the certificate, the signature is likely to be incorrect and the incompatabilities listed above are likely to arise.

    A common example is the "criticality" field present in each certificate extension, which immediately follows the specific extension type in the ASN.1 encoding. This field defaults to FALSE (0), and should never appear with a value of '0' in a proper DER encoding. The definition of the structure of each certificate extension is included below:

    Extension ::= SEQUENCE {
            extnId  EXTENSION.&id ({ExtensionSet}),
            critical BOOLEAN DEFAULT FALSE,
            extnValue OCTET STRING
                    -- contains a DER encoding of a value of type &ExtnType
                    -- for the extension object identified by extnId
    }
    

    In the example below of an invalid DER encoding, the beginning "SEQUENCE" marks a new certificateExtenson whose first field is the id of a particular extension (formatted for us by openssl below as "X509v3 Basic Constraints") and whose second field is a boolean with a default of false. A proper DER encoding, and thus a proper signature value, would not include the "BOOLEAN" line with a value of 0 below:

    $ openssl asn1parse -in /tmp/pmrs/ok-ca.cer|grep -B1 'BOOLEAN :0'
      507:d=4  hl=2 l=  15 cons: SEQUENCE          
      509:d=5  hl=2 l=   3 prim: OBJECT            :X509v3 Basic Constraints
      514:d=5  hl=2 l=   1 prim: BOOLEAN           :0   <--- criticality field, should not be present, or part of signature, in DER form
      517:d=5  hl=2 l=   5 prim: OCTET STRING      [HEX DUMP]:30030101FF
    

    Each extension must be checked against its definition in the OID database, as there are also extension-specific fields which may contain default-valued fields that must NOT be encoded with their default values.

    Solution

    Contact your certificate authority and provide them the info above to re-issue your certificate (or CA, depending on which is invalid). No workaround or circumvention is possible as improper DER encoding causes invalid cryptographically secure signatures which various software will need to check. If client software complains about re-use of serial numbers or other unusual certificate errors, some relief may be provided if you move to an environment where all HTTP Servers use 7.0.3.22 or later.

    Errors on z/Linux using cryptographic accelerator

    Possibly symptoms include:

    • Java crash in ikeyman on z/Linux when PKCS11 token is being manipulated
    • Error Message: "Cryptographic token initialization failed. Cryptographic token support will not be available."
    • Inability to use crypto offload at runtime

    Mandatory environment setup for z/Linux crypto offload

    See http://www-01.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?uid=swg21313367 for mandatory environemnt variables to be set for Ikeyman, gsk7capcimd, and the IHS runtime when crypto offload is used on z/Linux with GSKit 7.0.4.14 and later.

    Invalid PIN on crypto token

    During configuration using the pkcsconf tool, some error messages may not have been noticed and the "user PIN" may not have been set after being initialized. The PIN may also have been locked due to too many failing password attempts.

    If ikeyman crashes due to this issue, the top of the javacore backtrace will look like this:

    com.ibm.gsk.ikeyman.basic.CryptographicToken.c_BuildKeyLabelList(Native Method)

    Solution

    The user PIN must be changed/set (pkcsconf -p) after being initialized (pkcsconf -u). If the user PIN is locked due too many incorrect passwords, the token must be re-initialized (pkcsconf -I)

    More information on crypto setup

    See the following redbook: Using Cryptographic Adapters for Web Servers with Linux on IBM System z9 and zSeries

    See the How can I tell if my PKCS11 token is ready to be used by IBM HTTP Server? FAQ for information on interpreting/remediating pkcsconf flags

    Cryptographic Token runtime errors

    • SSL0154E: Initialization error, A PKCS#11 token is not present for the slot.

      Verify the SSLServerCert directive starts with the same "Label" as displayed by

      pkcsconf -t

      If your token mysteriously becomes empty on Linux, contact your Linux vendor for an updatad opencryptoki to a version subsequent to 2.2.8 that includes a fix for an issue that causes the on-disk soft-token to be truncated to 0 bytes. If this forces you to create your token, you may want to backup /var/lib/opencryptoki regularly.

    • [error] SSL0155E: Initialization error, The password/pin to access the PKCS#11 token is invalid.

      The file pointed to by the SSLStashFile directive, created with the <ihsinst>/bin/sslstash utility, does not contain the same password as the user PIN associated with the token indicated in SSLServerCert directive.

      Solution: Open your cryptographic token in ikeyman and verify the token name and label for your personal cert match your SSLServerCert directive in httpd.conf. Use the <ihsinst>/bin/sslstash utility to re-stash the User PIN to the file referenced by your SSLStashFile directive.

      You can query the cryptographic token on the command line, substituting your token label and password, with the command below. To be usable with IHS, you should have at least one result that has a private key (displayed with a dash in the first column)

      # LD_PRELOAD=/usr/lib/libcrypto.so.0.9.7 gsk7capicmd -cert -list -crypto /usr/lib/pkcs11/PKCS11_API.so -tokenlabel YOURTOKENLABEL -pw YOURUSERPIN
      Certificates found:
      * default, - has private key, ! trusted
              myca
      -       mylabel
      

      If no personal certificates exist, they must be created via ikeyman before IHS can use the crypto card.

    Cannot import certificate encrypted with a password that differs from keystore password

    Some non-GSKit certificate management utilities allow you to create private keys with one password and store them in a keystore with a different password. In GSKit utilities, it is assumed the private key and keystore password are the same.

    If you try to import a personal certificate of this type, GSKit will report that the private key is corrupted or unsupported, because it tries to decrypt it with the keystore password.

    The only known workaround is to use whatever native tool created the keystore and change the passwords.

    Duplicate certificate label for personal certificates

    In IBM HTTP Server v7 or later, the Ikeyman v8 bundled with java lists some personal certificates twice. This will be fixed in future JSSE maintenance. In the interim, backing up then removing the key.rdb request database will remove the GUI abnormality.

    There is no functional problem when the personal certificate label is duplicated.

    Cannot renew Verisign certificate

    When issuing a certificate, Verisign may add custom text to the Distinguished Name of the requested certificate in several Organizational Unit (OU) fields. When you renew this certificate via ikeyman, the Certificate Signing Request (CSR) will include the additional OU fields originally added by Verisign.

    Verisign may reject the CSR because it already explicitly contains the Verisign OU.

    Solution: Create a new certificate signing request instead of clicking "renew" in Ikeyman.

    Failure validating certificate issued by GPKI certificate authority

    GPKI is an SSL certificate standard published by the government of Japan that deviates from the two standards supported by IHS and the Tivoli Global Security Kit (GSKit). One such deviation that does not pass validation is an issuer chain with both a critical "Certificate Policies" (or any other RFC3280-specific) extension and a non-critical "Basic Constraints" extension

    The presence of an RFC3280-specific critical extension (e.g. Certificate Policies) anywhere in the validation chain forces GSKit to validate the certificate using RFC3280/PKIX rules, however PKIX rules state that issuer certificates MUST set the "Basic Constraints" extension as critical. These certificates fail validation. IHS 6.1.0.9 and later can support this specific deviation in otherwise RFC3280-compliant GPKI issuer certificates with the directive SSLAllowNonCriticalBasicConstraints.

    To determine if SSLAllowNonCriticalBasicConstraints is required for a specific server or client certificate, inspect the fields in each Certificate Authority (including intermediates) and look for BOTH of the following in the validation chain:

    • Any non end-entity (i.e. Signer/Issuer) certificate with the Basic Constraints field NOT marked critical
    • Any certificate with a field new in RFC3280 that is marked critical, e.g. Certificate Policies.

    Example Configuration:

    <VirtualHost *:443>
    SSLEnable
    SSLAllowNonCriticalBasicConstraints on
    </VirtualHost>
    

    Adding certificates before they're valid

    If an end-entity or issuer certificate is created with its beginning validity date in the future, it cannot be added to a KeyFile via ikeyman.

    • If the validity date is a short amount of time in the future due to differences in system time, as opposed to being intentionally post-dated, wait until the time on the ikeyman system "catches up" to the time on the system where the certificate was issued.
    • If the certificate's validity date is far in the future, consider re-issueing the certificate with the current date.
    • If the certificate cannot be re-issued with the current date within the validity range, wait until the certificate is valid to add it to your KeyFile.
    • If you cannot wait until the validity date to add the certificate to your KeyFile, copy the KeyFile to a workstation where the system date can be set to a date within the certificate's validity range and add the certificate on that system.

      When the issuer or end-entity certificate becomes valid, IHS will not begin to use it until IHS has been restarted within the validity range.

    Hangs or delays using key management tools and VMware

    On systems running inside of VMware, ikeyman and related tools can encounter a shortage of random data and appear to hang after many certificate operations.

    Solution: Perform complicated key management tasks on a native platform or retry with the following VMware configuration option set to 'false'

    monitor_control.virtual_rdtsc
  6. Gathering documentation for IHS support when problem is not a known issue

    Supplemental data to collect for cryptographic token related errors

    If a z/Linux crypto accelerator is being used, collect the following additional doc:

    Ikeyman problems

    1. Configure environment for Ikeyman trace
    2. Restart Ikeyman
    3. Recreate the problem and record the exact steps you take as well as the difference in expected/observed results into a text file (steps.txt). Append the KDB password to the list of steps.
    4. Send the following to IBM support:
      • ikm*.log in working directory.
      • KDB file in use along with accompanying .sth/.crl/.rdb files.
      • steps.txt, which contains the steps and expected/observed results as well as the KDB password.
      • httpd.conf
      • Any intermediate certificate provided by Certificate Authority
      • Details of cryptographic token configuration described above, when appropriate.

    IHS startup or request processing problems

    1. Set LogLevel to Debug and SSLTracein httpd.conf.
    2. Configure environment for GSKit trace
    3. Restart IBM HTTP Server.
    4. Start an iptrace that will show the interaction between the web browser and web server. This can be taken from the IHS server, the client machine, or another machine on the network. (Possible tools include sniffer, Network Monitor, or Ethereal.)
    5. Recreate the problem from the browser.
    6. Save a screen capture of the browser window.
    7. Send the following to IBM support:
      • web server error log, access log, and httpd.conf
      • Output from system and web server information, from ihsdiag collector tool
      • GSKit trace file
      • If a client certificate is in use, please include it along with any necessary CAs
      • IP trace file, unformatted
      • KDB file in use along with accompanying .sth/.crl/.rdb files as well as KDB password
      • Detail on time of request/handshake and IP address of client
      • Description of client and server trust chain with Certificate Authority in use
      • Details of cryptographic token configuration described above, when appropriate.