Exchange 2007: Renew Your SSL Certificate (DigiCert Utility)

Exchange 2007: Renewing Your Expiring SSL Certificate with the DigiCert Utility

You can use the DigiCert® Certificate Utility for Windows to create your CSR (certificate signing request) and then to install your SSL Certificate. You then use Exchange Management Shell to assign the services to the new SSL Certificate.

To Renew Your Exchange 2007 SSL Certificate:

1. Create your CSR.

   See Creating Your CSR Using the DigiCert Utility.

2. Install your new SSL Certificate.

   See Importing Your SSL Certificate Using the DigiCert Utility.

3. Configure or assign your new SSL Certificate.

   See Exchange 2007: Enabling Services for Your SSL Certificate with Exchange Management Shell.

1. Creating Your CSR Using the DigiCert Utility

Best practices are to generate a new certificate signing request (CSR) when renewing your SSL certificate.

1. On your Exchange 2007 server with the expiring certificate, download and save the DigiCert® Certificate Utility for Windows executable (DigiCertUtil.exe).

2. Run the DigiCert® Certificate Utility for Windows.

   Double-click DigiCertUtil.

3. In DigiCert Certificate Utility for Windows©, click SSL (gold lock), select the expiring certificate that you want to renew, and then, click Create CSR.

   

4. In the "Would you like to import the attributes from 'certificate' into the new CSR?" window, click Yes.

   

5. On the Create CSR page, verify that all the certificate details are correct, and then click Generate.

   

6. On DigiCert Certificate Utility for Windows© - Renew Certificate page, do one of the following, and then, click Close:

   Click Copy CSR.	Copies the certificate contents to the clipboard.
   	If you use this option, we recommend that you paste the CSR into a tool such as Notepad.
   	If you forget and copy some other item, you still have access to the CSR, and you do not have to go back and recreate it.
   Click Save to File.	Saves the CSR as a .txt file to the Windows server.
   	We recommend that you use this option.

   

Renew Your SSL Certificate

Renew your SSL certificate from inside your DigiCert CertCentral account.

Are you new to the DigiCert team? You can "replace" your certificate with a DigiCert certificate. Order your new certificate here - Purchase Your DigiCert Certificate.

1. Log into your CertCentral account.

2. In CertCentral, in the left main menu, click Certificates > Expiring Certificates.

3. On the Expiring Certificates page, next to the certificate you want to renew, click Renew Now.

   A certificate doesn't appear on the Expiring Certificates page until 90 days before it expires.

4. Follow the instructions provided inside your account to renew your SSL certificate.

5. Add your CSR

   When renewing the certificate, you'll need to include a CSR. On the "Renewal" page, under Certificate Settings, upload the CSR file you saved to the server.

   You can also use a text editor (such as Notepad) to open the file. Then, copy the text, including the -----BEGIN NEW CERTIFICATE REQUEST----- and -----END NEW CERTIFICATE REQUEST----- tags, and paste it in the Add Your CSR box.

6. After you place the order to renew your certificate, DigiCert verifies your information.

7. If we need any additional information, we will promptly contact you by phone or email. If no additional information is required, we will most likely issue your certificate within an hour.

2. Importing Your SSL Certificate Using the DigiCert Utility

Once DigiCert issues your renewal SSL Certificate, you need to run the DigiCert Certificate Utility to import it to your Exchange 2007 server.

1. After receiving your new certificate file from DigiCert, save the file to the Exchange 2007 server where you created the CSR.

2. On the same server, run the DigiCert® Certificate Utility for Windows.

   Double-click DigiCertUtil.

3. In DigiCert Certificate Utility for Windows©, click SSL (gold lock) and then, click Import.

   

4. In the Certificate Import wizard, click Browse to browse to the .cer certificate file (i.e. mail_yourwebsite_com.cer) that DigiCert sent you, select the file, click Open, and then, click Next.

   

5. In the Enter a new friendly name or you can accept the default box, type a friendly name for the certificate.

   Note:    The friendly name is not part of the certificate; instead, it is used to identify the certificate.

   We recommend that you add DigiCert and the expiration date to the end of your friendly name, for example: yoursite-digicert-(expiration date). This information helps identify the issuer and expiration date for each certificate. It also helps distinguish multiple certificates with the same domain name.

   

6. To import the SSL Certificate to your server, click Finish.

   You should receive "Your certificate has been successfully imported" message. You are now ready to assign/configure your server software to use the renewed SSL Certificate.

3. Exchange 2007: Enabling Services for Your SSL Certificate with Exchange Management Shell

If you have not yet created your certificate signing request (CSR) and ordered your certificate, see Creating Your CSR Using the DigiCert Utility.

Get Your Certificate’s Thumbprint

1. Run the DigiCert® Certificate Utility for Windows.

   Double-click DigiCertUtil.

2. In DigiCert Certificate Utility for Windows©, click SSL (gold lock), right-click on your newly imported certificate, and then, click Copy thumbprint to clipboard.

   

   You can also get your thumbprint by running the following command in Exchange Management Shell:

   [PS] C:\> Get-ExchangeCertificate -DomainName your.domain.name

Enable Your Certificate for Use with Exchange

3. Open Exchange Management Shell (Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 > Exchange Management Shell).

4. To configure Exchange to use the renewed SSL Certificate (with the new thumbprint) for your various Exchange Services, run the following Enable-Exchange Certificate command:

      Enable-ExchangeCertificate -ThumbPrint insert_thumbprint -Services "SMTP, IMAP, POP, IIS"

   Note:    Only include the services you're using (i.e. SMTP, IMAP, POP, or IIS ).

5. Your new SSL Certificate should now be installed to the Exchange 2007 mail domain with the services that you selected.

Test Your Installation

To verify that the installation is correct, use our DigiCert® SSL Installation Diagnostics Tool and enter the DNS name of the site (i.e. www.yourdomain.com, or mail.yourdomain.com) that you are securing to test your SSL Certificate.

Troubleshooting

After importing your certificate on to the new server, if you run into certificate errors, try repairing your certificate trust errors using DigiCert® Certificate Utility for Windows. If this does not fix the errors, contact support.