5 ocsp - Online Certificate Status Protocol utility
36 [B<-attime timestamp>]
58 [B<-verify_depth num>]
59 [B<-verify_email email>]
60 [B<-verify_hostname hostname>]
62 [B<-verify_name name>]
65 [B<-validity_period n>]
68 [B<-verify_other file>]
71 [B<-no_signature_verify>]
91 The Online Certificate Status Protocol (OCSP) enables applications to
92 determine the (revocation) state of an identified certificate (RFC 2560).
94 The B<ocsp> command performs many common OCSP tasks. It can be used
95 to print out requests and responses, create requests and send queries
96 to an OCSP responder and behave like a mini OCSP server itself.
98 =head1 OCSP CLIENT OPTIONS
104 Print out a usage message.
106 =item B<-out filename>
108 specify output filename, default is standard output.
110 =item B<-issuer filename>
112 This specifies the current issuer certificate. This option can be used
113 multiple times. The certificate specified in B<filename> must be in
114 PEM format. This option B<MUST> come before any B<-cert> options.
116 =item B<-cert filename>
118 Add the certificate B<filename> to the request. The issuer certificate
119 is taken from the previous B<issuer> option, or an error occurs if no
120 issuer certificate is specified.
124 Same as the B<cert> option except the certificate with serial number
125 B<num> is added to the request. The serial number is interpreted as a
126 decimal integer unless preceded by B<0x>. Negative integers can also
127 be specified by preceding the value by a B<-> sign.
129 =item B<-signer filename>, B<-signkey filename>
131 Sign the OCSP request using the certificate specified in the B<signer>
132 option and the private key specified by the B<signkey> option. If
133 the B<signkey> option is not present then the private key is read
134 from the same file as the certificate. If neither option is specified then
135 the OCSP request is not signed.
137 =item B<-sign_other filename>
139 Additional certificates to include in the signed request.
141 =item B<-nonce>, B<-no_nonce>
143 Add an OCSP nonce extension to a request or disable OCSP nonce addition.
144 Normally if an OCSP request is input using the B<reqin> option no
145 nonce is added: using the B<nonce> option will force addition of a nonce.
146 If an OCSP request is being created (using B<cert> and B<serial> options)
147 a nonce is automatically added specifying B<no_nonce> overrides this.
149 =item B<-req_text>, B<-resp_text>, B<-text>
151 print out the text form of the OCSP request, response or both respectively.
153 =item B<-reqout file>, B<-respout file>
155 write out the DER encoded certificate request or response to B<file>.
157 =item B<-reqin file>, B<-respin file>
159 read OCSP request or response file from B<file>. These option are ignored
160 if OCSP request or response creation is implied by other options (for example
161 with B<serial>, B<cert> and B<host> options).
163 =item B<-url responder_url>
165 specify the responder URL. Both HTTP and HTTPS (SSL/TLS) URLs can be specified.
167 =item B<-host hostname:port>, B<-path pathname>
169 if the B<host> option is present then the OCSP request is sent to the host
170 B<hostname> on port B<port>. B<path> specifies the HTTP path name to use
171 or "/" by default. This is equivalent to specifying B<-url> with scheme
172 http:// and the given hostname, port, and pathname.
174 =item B<-header name=value>
176 Adds the header B<name> with the specified B<value> to the OCSP request
177 that is sent to the responder.
178 This may be repeated.
180 =item B<-timeout seconds>
182 connection timeout to the OCSP responder in seconds
184 =item B<-CAfile file>, B<-CApath pathname>
186 file or pathname containing trusted CA certificates. These are used to verify
187 the signature on the OCSP response.
191 Do not load the trusted CA certificates from the default file location
195 Do not load the trusted CA certificates from the default directory location
197 =item B<-attime>, B<-check_ss_sig>, B<-crl_check>, B<-crl_check_all>,
198 B<-explicit_policy>, B<-extended_crl>, B<-ignore_critical>, B<-inhibit_any>,
199 B<-inhibit_map>, B<-no_alt_chains>, B<-no_check_time>, B<-partial_chain>, B<-policy>,
200 B<-policy_check>, B<-policy_print>, B<-purpose>, B<-suiteB_128>,
201 B<-suiteB_128_only>, B<-suiteB_192>, B<-trusted_first>, B<-use_deltas>,
202 B<-auth_level>, B<-verify_depth>, B<-verify_email>, B<-verify_hostname>,
203 B<-verify_ip>, B<-verify_name>, B<-x509_strict>
205 Set different certificate verification options.
206 See L<verify(1)> manual page for details.
208 =item B<-verify_other file>
210 file containing additional certificates to search when attempting to locate
211 the OCSP response signing certificate. Some responders omit the actual signer's
212 certificate from the response: this option can be used to supply the necessary
213 certificate in such cases.
215 =item B<-trust_other>
217 the certificates specified by the B<-verify_other> option should be explicitly
218 trusted and no additional checks will be performed on them. This is useful
219 when the complete responder certificate chain is not available or trusting a
220 root CA is not appropriate.
222 =item B<-VAfile file>
224 file containing explicitly trusted responder certificates. Equivalent to the
225 B<-verify_other> and B<-trust_other> options.
229 don't attempt to verify the OCSP response signature or the nonce values. This
230 option will normally only be used for debugging since it disables all verification
231 of the responders certificate.
235 ignore certificates contained in the OCSP response when searching for the
236 signers certificate. With this option the signers certificate must be specified
237 with either the B<-verify_other> or B<-VAfile> options.
239 =item B<-no_signature_verify>
241 don't check the signature on the OCSP response. Since this option tolerates invalid
242 signatures on OCSP responses it will normally only be used for testing purposes.
244 =item B<-no_cert_verify>
246 don't verify the OCSP response signers certificate at all. Since this option allows
247 the OCSP response to be signed by any certificate it should only be used for
252 do not use certificates in the response as additional untrusted CA
255 =item B<-no_explicit>
257 do not explicitly trust the root CA if it is set to be trusted for OCSP signing.
259 =item B<-no_cert_checks>
261 don't perform any additional checks on the OCSP response signers certificate.
262 That is do not make any checks to see if the signers certificate is authorised
263 to provide the necessary status information: as a result this option should
264 only be used for testing purposes.
266 =item B<-validity_period nsec>, B<-status_age age>
268 these options specify the range of times, in seconds, which will be tolerated
269 in an OCSP response. Each certificate status response includes a B<notBefore> time and
270 an optional B<notAfter> time. The current time should fall between these two values, but
271 the interval between the two times may be only a few seconds. In practice the OCSP
272 responder and clients clocks may not be precisely synchronised and so such a check
273 may fail. To avoid this the B<-validity_period> option can be used to specify an
274 acceptable error range in seconds, the default value is 5 minutes.
276 If the B<notAfter> time is omitted from a response then this means that new status
277 information is immediately available. In this case the age of the B<notBefore> field
278 is checked to see it is not older than B<age> seconds old. By default this additional
279 check is not performed.
283 this option sets digest algorithm to use for certificate identification
285 Any digest supported by the OpenSSL B<dgst> command can be used.
286 The default is SHA-1.
290 =head1 OCSP SERVER OPTIONS
294 =item B<-index indexfile>
296 B<indexfile> is a text index file in B<ca> format containing certificate revocation
299 If the B<index> option is specified the B<ocsp> utility is in responder mode, otherwise
300 it is in client mode. The request(s) the responder processes can be either specified on
301 the command line (using B<issuer> and B<serial> options), supplied in a file (using the
302 B<reqin> option) or via external OCSP clients (if B<port> or B<url> is specified).
304 If the B<index> option is present then the B<CA> and B<rsigner> options must also be
309 CA certificate corresponding to the revocation information in B<indexfile>.
311 =item B<-rsigner file>
313 The certificate to sign OCSP responses with.
315 =item B<-rother file>
317 Additional certificates to include in the OCSP response.
319 =item B<-resp_no_certs>
321 Don't include any certificates in the OCSP response.
323 =item B<-resp_key_id>
325 Identify the signer certificate using the key ID, default is to use the subject name.
329 The private key to sign OCSP responses with: if not present the file specified in the
330 B<rsigner> option is used.
332 =item B<-port portnum>
334 Port to listen for OCSP requests on. The port may also be specified using the B<url>
337 =item B<-nrequest number>
339 The OCSP server will exit after receiving B<number> requests, default unlimited.
341 =item B<-nmin minutes>, B<-ndays days>
343 Number of minutes or days when fresh revocation information is available: used in the
344 B<nextUpdate> field. If neither option is present then the B<nextUpdate> field is
345 omitted meaning fresh revocation information is immediately available.
349 =head1 OCSP Response verification.
351 OCSP Response follows the rules specified in RFC2560.
353 Initially the OCSP responder certificate is located and the signature on
354 the OCSP request checked using the responder certificate's public key.
356 Then a normal certificate verify is performed on the OCSP responder certificate
357 building up a certificate chain in the process. The locations of the trusted
358 certificates used to build the chain can be specified by the B<CAfile>
359 and B<CApath> options or they will be looked for in the standard OpenSSL
360 certificates directory.
362 If the initial verify fails then the OCSP verify process halts with an
365 Otherwise the issuing CA certificate in the request is compared to the OCSP
366 responder certificate: if there is a match then the OCSP verify succeeds.
368 Otherwise the OCSP responder certificate's CA is checked against the issuing
369 CA certificate in the request. If there is a match and the OCSPSigning
370 extended key usage is present in the OCSP responder certificate then the
371 OCSP verify succeeds.
373 Otherwise, if B<-no_explicit> is B<not> set the root CA of the OCSP responders
374 CA is checked to see if it is trusted for OCSP signing. If it is the OCSP
377 If none of these checks is successful then the OCSP verify fails.
379 What this effectively means if that if the OCSP responder certificate is
380 authorised directly by the CA it is issuing revocation information about
381 (and it is correctly configured) then verification will succeed.
383 If the OCSP responder is a "global responder" which can give details about
384 multiple CAs and has its own separate certificate chain then its root
385 CA can be trusted for OCSP signing. For example:
387 openssl x509 -in ocspCA.pem -addtrust OCSPSigning -out trustedCA.pem
389 Alternatively the responder certificate itself can be explicitly trusted
390 with the B<-VAfile> option.
394 As noted, most of the verify options are for testing or debugging purposes.
395 Normally only the B<-CApath>, B<-CAfile> and (if the responder is a 'global
396 VA') B<-VAfile> options need to be used.
398 The OCSP server is only useful for test and demonstration purposes: it is
399 not really usable as a full OCSP responder. It contains only a very
400 simple HTTP request handling and can only handle the POST form of OCSP
401 queries. It also handles requests serially meaning it cannot respond to
402 new requests until it has processed the current one. The text index file
403 format of revocation is also inefficient for large quantities of revocation
406 It is possible to run the B<ocsp> application in responder mode via a CGI
407 script using the B<reqin> and B<respout> options.
411 Create an OCSP request and write it to a file:
413 openssl ocsp -issuer issuer.pem -cert c1.pem -cert c2.pem -reqout req.der
415 Send a query to an OCSP responder with URL http://ocsp.myhost.com/ save the
416 response to a file, print it out in text form, and verify the response:
418 openssl ocsp -issuer issuer.pem -cert c1.pem -cert c2.pem \
419 -url http://ocsp.myhost.com/ -resp_text -respout resp.der
421 Read in an OCSP response and print out text form:
423 openssl ocsp -respin resp.der -text -noverify
425 OCSP server on port 8888 using a standard B<ca> configuration, and a separate
426 responder certificate. All requests and responses are printed to a file.
428 openssl ocsp -index demoCA/index.txt -port 8888 -rsigner rcert.pem -CA demoCA/cacert.pem
431 As above but exit after processing one request:
433 openssl ocsp -index demoCA/index.txt -port 8888 -rsigner rcert.pem -CA demoCA/cacert.pem
436 Query status information using an internally generated request:
438 openssl ocsp -index demoCA/index.txt -rsigner rcert.pem -CA demoCA/cacert.pem
439 -issuer demoCA/cacert.pem -serial 1
441 Query status information using request read from a file, and write the response
444 openssl ocsp -index demoCA/index.txt -rsigner rcert.pem -CA demoCA/cacert.pem
445 -reqin req.der -respout resp.der
449 The -no_alt_chains options was first added to OpenSSL 1.1.0.