5 ocsp - Online Certificate Status Protocol utility
36 [B<-attime timestamp>]
57 [B<-verify_depth num>]
58 [B<-verify_email email>]
59 [B<-verify_hostname hostname>]
61 [B<-verify_name name>]
64 [B<-validity_period n>]
67 [B<-verify_other file>]
70 [B<-no_signature_verify>]
90 The Online Certificate Status Protocol (OCSP) enables applications to
91 determine the (revocation) state of an identified certificate (RFC 2560).
93 The B<ocsp> command performs many common OCSP tasks. It can be used
94 to print out requests and responses, create requests and send queries
95 to an OCSP responder and behave like a mini OCSP server itself.
97 =head1 OCSP CLIENT OPTIONS
103 Print out a usage message.
105 =item B<-out filename>
107 specify output filename, default is standard output.
109 =item B<-issuer filename>
111 This specifies the current issuer certificate. This option can be used
112 multiple times. The certificate specified in B<filename> must be in
113 PEM format. This option B<MUST> come before any B<-cert> options.
115 =item B<-cert filename>
117 Add the certificate B<filename> to the request. The issuer certificate
118 is taken from the previous B<issuer> option, or an error occurs if no
119 issuer certificate is specified.
123 Same as the B<cert> option except the certificate with serial number
124 B<num> is added to the request. The serial number is interpreted as a
125 decimal integer unless preceded by B<0x>. Negative integers can also
126 be specified by preceding the value by a B<-> sign.
128 =item B<-signer filename>, B<-signkey filename>
130 Sign the OCSP request using the certificate specified in the B<signer>
131 option and the private key specified by the B<signkey> option. If
132 the B<signkey> option is not present then the private key is read
133 from the same file as the certificate. If neither option is specified then
134 the OCSP request is not signed.
136 =item B<-sign_other filename>
138 Additional certificates to include in the signed request.
140 =item B<-nonce>, B<-no_nonce>
142 Add an OCSP nonce extension to a request or disable OCSP nonce addition.
143 Normally if an OCSP request is input using the B<respin> option no
144 nonce is added: using the B<nonce> option will force addition of a nonce.
145 If an OCSP request is being created (using B<cert> and B<serial> options)
146 a nonce is automatically added specifying B<no_nonce> overrides this.
148 =item B<-req_text>, B<-resp_text>, B<-text>
150 print out the text form of the OCSP request, response or both respectively.
152 =item B<-reqout file>, B<-respout file>
154 write out the DER encoded certificate request or response to B<file>.
156 =item B<-reqin file>, B<-respin file>
158 read OCSP request or response file from B<file>. These option are ignored
159 if OCSP request or response creation is implied by other options (for example
160 with B<serial>, B<cert> and B<host> options).
162 =item B<-url responder_url>
164 specify the responder URL. Both HTTP and HTTPS (SSL/TLS) URLs can be specified.
166 =item B<-host hostname:port>, B<-path pathname>
168 if the B<host> option is present then the OCSP request is sent to the host
169 B<hostname> on port B<port>. B<path> specifies the HTTP path name to use
172 =item B<-header name=value>
174 Adds the header B<name> with the specified B<value> to the OCSP request
175 that is sent to the responder.
176 This may be repeated.
178 =item B<-timeout seconds>
180 connection timeout to the OCSP responder in seconds
182 =item B<-CAfile file>, B<-CApath pathname>
184 file or pathname containing trusted CA certificates. These are used to verify
185 the signature on the OCSP response.
189 Do not load the trusted CA certificates from the default file location
193 Do not load the trusted CA certificates from the default directory location
195 =item B<-attime>, B<-check_ss_sig>, B<-crl_check>, B<-crl_check_all>,
196 B<explicit_policy>, B<-extended_crl>, B<-ignore_critical>, B<-inhibit_any>,
197 B<-inhibit_map>, B<-issuer_checks>, B<-partial_chain>, B<-policy>,
198 B<-policy_check>, B<-policy_print>, B<-purpose>, B<-suiteB_128>,
199 B<-suiteB_128_only>, B<-suiteB_192>, B<-trusted_first>, B<-no_alt_chains>,
200 B<-use_deltas>, B<-verify_depth>, B<-verify_email>, B<-verify_hostname>,
201 B<-verify_ip>, B<-verify_name>, B<-x509_strict>
203 Set different certificate verification options.
204 See L<B<verify>|verify(1)> manual page for details.
206 =item B<-verify_other file>
208 file containing additional certificates to search when attempting to locate
209 the OCSP response signing certificate. Some responders omit the actual signer's
210 certificate from the response: this option can be used to supply the necessary
211 certificate in such cases.
213 =item B<-trust_other>
215 the certificates specified by the B<-verify_other> option should be explicitly
216 trusted and no additional checks will be performed on them. This is useful
217 when the complete responder certificate chain is not available or trusting a
218 root CA is not appropriate.
220 =item B<-VAfile file>
222 file containing explicitly trusted responder certificates. Equivalent to the
223 B<-verify_other> and B<-trust_other> options.
227 don't attempt to verify the OCSP response signature or the nonce values. This
228 option will normally only be used for debugging since it disables all verification
229 of the responders certificate.
233 ignore certificates contained in the OCSP response when searching for the
234 signers certificate. With this option the signers certificate must be specified
235 with either the B<-verify_other> or B<-VAfile> options.
237 =item B<-no_signature_verify>
239 don't check the signature on the OCSP response. Since this option tolerates invalid
240 signatures on OCSP responses it will normally only be used for testing purposes.
242 =item B<-no_cert_verify>
244 don't verify the OCSP response signers certificate at all. Since this option allows
245 the OCSP response to be signed by any certificate it should only be used for
250 do not use certificates in the response as additional untrusted CA
253 =item B<-no_explicit>
255 do not explicitly trust the root CA if it is set to be trusted for OCSP signing.
257 =item B<-no_cert_checks>
259 don't perform any additional checks on the OCSP response signers certificate.
260 That is do not make any checks to see if the signers certificate is authorised
261 to provide the necessary status information: as a result this option should
262 only be used for testing purposes.
264 =item B<-validity_period nsec>, B<-status_age age>
266 these options specify the range of times, in seconds, which will be tolerated
267 in an OCSP response. Each certificate status response includes a B<notBefore> time and
268 an optional B<notAfter> time. The current time should fall between these two values, but
269 the interval between the two times may be only a few seconds. In practice the OCSP
270 responder and clients clocks may not be precisely synchronised and so such a check
271 may fail. To avoid this the B<-validity_period> option can be used to specify an
272 acceptable error range in seconds, the default value is 5 minutes.
274 If the B<notAfter> time is omitted from a response then this means that new status
275 information is immediately available. In this case the age of the B<notBefore> field
276 is checked to see it is not older than B<age> seconds old. By default this additional
277 check is not performed.
281 this option sets digest algorithm to use for certificate identification
283 Any digest supported by the OpenSSL B<dgst> command can be used.
284 The default is SHA-1.
288 =head1 OCSP SERVER OPTIONS
292 =item B<-index indexfile>
294 B<indexfile> is a text index file in B<ca> format containing certificate revocation
297 If the B<index> option is specified the B<ocsp> utility is in responder mode, otherwise
298 it is in client mode. The request(s) the responder processes can be either specified on
299 the command line (using B<issuer> and B<serial> options), supplied in a file (using the
300 B<respin> option) or via external OCSP clients (if B<port> or B<url> is specified).
302 If the B<index> option is present then the B<CA> and B<rsigner> options must also be
307 CA certificate corresponding to the revocation information in B<indexfile>.
309 =item B<-rsigner file>
311 The certificate to sign OCSP responses with.
313 =item B<-rother file>
315 Additional certificates to include in the OCSP response.
317 =item B<-resp_no_certs>
319 Don't include any certificates in the OCSP response.
321 =item B<-resp_key_id>
323 Identify the signer certificate using the key ID, default is to use the subject name.
327 The private key to sign OCSP responses with: if not present the file specified in the
328 B<rsigner> option is used.
330 =item B<-port portnum>
332 Port to listen for OCSP requests on. The port may also be specified using the B<url>
335 =item B<-nrequest number>
337 The OCSP server will exit after receiving B<number> requests, default unlimited.
339 =item B<-nmin minutes>, B<-ndays days>
341 Number of minutes or days when fresh revocation information is available: used in the
342 B<nextUpdate> field. If neither option is present then the B<nextUpdate> field is
343 omitted meaning fresh revocation information is immediately available.
347 =head1 OCSP Response verification.
349 OCSP Response follows the rules specified in RFC2560.
351 Initially the OCSP responder certificate is located and the signature on
352 the OCSP request checked using the responder certificate's public key.
354 Then a normal certificate verify is performed on the OCSP responder certificate
355 building up a certificate chain in the process. The locations of the trusted
356 certificates used to build the chain can be specified by the B<CAfile>
357 and B<CApath> options or they will be looked for in the standard OpenSSL
358 certificates directory.
360 If the initial verify fails then the OCSP verify process halts with an
363 Otherwise the issuing CA certificate in the request is compared to the OCSP
364 responder certificate: if there is a match then the OCSP verify succeeds.
366 Otherwise the OCSP responder certificate's CA is checked against the issuing
367 CA certificate in the request. If there is a match and the OCSPSigning
368 extended key usage is present in the OCSP responder certificate then the
369 OCSP verify succeeds.
371 Otherwise, if B<-no_explicit> is B<not> set the root CA of the OCSP responders
372 CA is checked to see if it is trusted for OCSP signing. If it is the OCSP
375 If none of these checks is successful then the OCSP verify fails.
377 What this effectively means if that if the OCSP responder certificate is
378 authorised directly by the CA it is issuing revocation information about
379 (and it is correctly configured) then verification will succeed.
381 If the OCSP responder is a "global responder" which can give details about
382 multiple CAs and has its own separate certificate chain then its root
383 CA can be trusted for OCSP signing. For example:
385 openssl x509 -in ocspCA.pem -addtrust OCSPSigning -out trustedCA.pem
387 Alternatively the responder certificate itself can be explicitly trusted
388 with the B<-VAfile> option.
392 As noted, most of the verify options are for testing or debugging purposes.
393 Normally only the B<-CApath>, B<-CAfile> and (if the responder is a 'global
394 VA') B<-VAfile> options need to be used.
396 The OCSP server is only useful for test and demonstration purposes: it is
397 not really usable as a full OCSP responder. It contains only a very
398 simple HTTP request handling and can only handle the POST form of OCSP
399 queries. It also handles requests serially meaning it cannot respond to
400 new requests until it has processed the current one. The text index file
401 format of revocation is also inefficient for large quantities of revocation
404 It is possible to run the B<ocsp> application in responder mode via a CGI
405 script using the B<respin> and B<respout> options.
409 Create an OCSP request and write it to a file:
411 openssl ocsp -issuer issuer.pem -cert c1.pem -cert c2.pem -reqout req.der
413 Send a query to an OCSP responder with URL http://ocsp.myhost.com/ save the
414 response to a file and print it out in text form
416 openssl ocsp -issuer issuer.pem -cert c1.pem -cert c2.pem \
417 -url http://ocsp.myhost.com/ -resp_text -respout resp.der
419 Read in an OCSP response and print out text form:
421 openssl ocsp -respin resp.der -text
423 OCSP server on port 8888 using a standard B<ca> configuration, and a separate
424 responder certificate. All requests and responses are printed to a file.
426 openssl ocsp -index demoCA/index.txt -port 8888 -rsigner rcert.pem -CA demoCA/cacert.pem
429 As above but exit after processing one request:
431 openssl ocsp -index demoCA/index.txt -port 8888 -rsigner rcert.pem -CA demoCA/cacert.pem
434 Query status information using internally generated request:
436 openssl ocsp -index demoCA/index.txt -rsigner rcert.pem -CA demoCA/cacert.pem
437 -issuer demoCA/cacert.pem -serial 1
439 Query status information using request read from a file, write response to a
442 openssl ocsp -index demoCA/index.txt -rsigner rcert.pem -CA demoCA/cacert.pem
443 -reqin req.der -respout resp.der
447 The -no_alt_chains options was first added to OpenSSL 1.1.0.