Re-issuing (also Re-Keying) an SSL certificate is the process of generating a new private key and CSR for an existing issued certificate. Re-issuing an SSL certificate involves creating a new private key along with a new CSR and submitting the request to the certificate authority. The process results in a new SSL certificate being issued.
SSL Certificate Reissue
Why Reissue an SSL Certificate?
An SSL Certificate Reissue is done to keep your certificate secure and private if it is moved, or some information on your SSL was changed - the reissue allows you to get a brand-new certificate code. A Reissue for an SSL Certificate might be necessary for different causes, for example:
- Changing the approver mail
- The private key has been lost, deleted or compromised
- Changing the hashing algorithm from SHA1 to SHA2
- The website moved to another web server
- The web server software has changed
- Some outage or bug occurring that affects the currently active certificate
Reissuing and signing a certificate under the DigiCert PKI
Since this is a hot topic, for the purpose of reissuing and signing a certificate under the DigiCert PKI after December 1st 2017 we recommend to apply the minimum that's necessary to reissue a certificate:
- Use the old CSR (i.e. don't provide a new one)
- Do not apply any other changes (like approver mail, common name, organisation name, etc.)
Afterwards replace the old CRT with the new CRT.