About the The Fed4FIRE+ Login CertificateΒΆ

Fed4FIRE+ works with X.509 certificates and RSA private keys to authenticate and authorize experimenters on testbeds.

When you created an account, a random private RSA key was created for you, and in addition the authority created a matching certificate.

This certificate is used by testbeds to securely identify you. Testbeds can decide which certificates from which authorities they accept. In this way, a federation of testbeds and authorities is established. Fed4FIRE is such a federation.

This certificate is bundled together with your private key into a single PEM-file, called the login certificate.

Note

The certificate has an expire date, after which it is no longer valid. You can renew the certificate via the portal website

Some tools, like jFed will automatically download the login certificate for you when logging in. Other tools require you to download it from the authority website and pass it to them as a file.