What is a Digital Certificate?

Digital Certificates, also called Digital ID's, are the electronic counterparts to driver licenses, passports or membership cards. Digital Certificates are based on what is called Public Key Infrastructure (or PKI). Unlike Symmetric Key Encryption - where the encryption key is the same as the decryption key - PKI is a giant leap forward because it is an encryption system that uses a unique key pair consisting of a private key (known only by the owner) and a public key (that is widely known - you can find someone's public key by clicking here) in order to encrypt and decrypt messages. Digital certificates bring you Trust and Security when you communicate or do business on the Net by providing these four essential Trust factors:

Authentication : knowing with absolute certainty who you are communicating with.
Integrity : keeping the content of the communication intact after it is created.
Confidentiality : keeping the content of the communication secret from unauthorised readers.
Non-repudiation : having proof of all parties approval after a transaction. Certificates are based on common Internet standards such as X.509, RSA, PKCS, PKIX, S/MIME and SSL.