DECEMBER 2023

The EJBCA team is pleased to announce the release of EJBCA 8.2. This release adds support for key archival and recovery in Microsoft auto-enrollment, RA chaining for hybrid deployments as well as HSM integration support for post-quantum certificate issuance. The release also includes various improvements and error corrections.

Deployment options include EJBCA Software Appliance, EJBCA Hardware Appliance, and EJBCA Cloud.

Highlights

Post-Quantum Certificate Issuance with HSM Support

EJBCA supports the Dilithium and Falcon NIST candidate post-quantum algorithms since EJBCA 8.0. EJBCA 8.2 now introduces support for the use of a hardware security module (HSM) with support for the Dilithium algorithm.

Since Dilithium is not part of the PKCS11 standard, it requires an HSM vendor-defined extension in the PKCS11 interface. For information about supported HSM vendors and models, contact Keyfactor.

Note that the Dilithium algorithm is suitable for non-production use only. NIST standardization is planned for completion in 2024 and the Dilithium algorithm can be used for proof-of-concept (PoC) and post-quantum transition preparation activities until then. For more information, see Post-quantum Cryptography Keys and Signatures.

Microsoft Auto-Enrollment Key Archival

EJBCA 8.2 introduces a new option in Microsoft auto-enrollment enabling administrators to configure key archival in the EJBCA setup for MSAE. Key archival is typically used in use cases like certificates for Encrypted File Systems (EFS) and encrypted e-mails using S/MIME certificates.

Key Archival can be enabled per end entity profile. For profiles with key archival enabled, the private keys corresponding to issued certificates will be encrypted and stored in EJBCA. If a private key is lost, EJBCA allows a CA administrator to recover the key for a user.

For information on how to set up EJBCA for key archival in Microsoft Auto-enrollment, refer to EJBCA Configuration.

RA Chaining

EJBCA 8.2 implements RA chaining support to enable zero trust hybrid and multi-cloud PKI deployments based on extended flexibility in distributed EJBCA deployments. The established EJBCA security model for separating the Registration Authority (RA) and Validation Authority (VA) from the Certificate Authority (CA) in EJBCA deployments is based on setting up mTLS-secured peer connections initiated from the CA to the RA and the VA. The associated network setup will normally not accept any incoming connections to the CA. Instead, all external communication is targeting the RA and VA and these communicate with the CA through the mTLS peer connections.

For certain deployment scenarios, customers want to deploy an EJBCA RA in a network environment that is set up not to accept incoming connections from where the EJBCA CA is deployed. The RA chaining feature is introduced to support such deployments. An RA chaining-based setup uses the same principles for the separation of CA, RA, and VA as described above. One or more additional RAs are then deployed in an external environment. These additional EJBCA RAs use outgoing mTLS-secured peer connections to an EJBCA RA traditionally connected to the EJBCA CA. For details on how to set up EJBCA instances in your PKI infrastructure as described above, see RA Chaining. 

Announcements

Deprecation of DSA Algorithm

The use of the DSA algorithm in EJBCA is deprecated as of EJBCA 8.2. DSA algorithm support is scheduled to be removed in an upcoming release, and users are advised to use other algorithms in its place.

Upgrade Information

Review the EJBCA Upgrade Notes for important information about this release. For upgrade instructions and information on upgrade paths, see Upgrading EJBCA.

EJBCA 8.2 is included in EJBCA Software Appliance 2.5, EJBCA Hardware Appliance 3.13, and EJBCA Cloud 3.4.

Change Log: Resolved Issues

The following lists implemented features and fixed issues in EJBCA 8.2.

Issues Resolved in 8.2

Released December 2023

New Features

ECA-11720 - P11NG-CLI ability to list and delete data objects

ECA-11844 - Capability to issue CA Exchange Certificate via MSAE

ECA-11849 - Add Utimaco PKCS#11 R3 to defaultvalues.properties

ECA-11850 - Support AWS Service Roles for AWSKMS Crypto Tokens

ECA-11851 - Handle Key Exchange Token request / response from MSAE Servlet

ECA-11862 - Add dropdown in MSAE alias config for Exchange Certificate Profile

ECA-11863 - Add x509 extensions for MS Exchange Certificate to certificate profiles

ECA-11864 - Allow caller to customize whats checked in health checks

ECA-11876 - SOAP WS API: Support more fields when creating CAs

ECA-11883 - Background Service Renewing CA Exchange Certificate

ECA-11907 - Add keyusage flag to cryptotoken generatekey ability to modify attributes in p11ng-cli

ECA-11911 - Integrate MSAE key archival workflow with createCertficiateWs

ECA-11929 - Documentation for RA Chaining

ECA-11937 - Add keyusage flag to REST API generateKeyPair

ECA-11938 - Add p11 attribute override ability in p11ng-cli

Improvements

ECA-6415 - Searching for certificates in the RA web is slow

ECA-10698 - Inspect Certificate/CSR in RA UI

ECA-11613 - DER format CSR enrolment via REST API

ECA-11620 - Normalize the CMP Configuration page according to UX design conventions

ECA-11621 - Normalize the EST Configuration page according to UX design conventions

ECA-11622 - Normalize the SCEP Configuration page according to UX design conventions

ECA-11646 - Extended flexibility in CMP RA mode validation logic

ECA-11662 - Add a new REST endpoint to trigger Service workers

ECA-11798 - Improve handling of HSM connection timeouts

ECA-11804 - OCSP response pre-production during issuance/revocation

ECA-11846 - Peer publisher should always publish certificate contents for CA and OCSP certificates

ECA-11852 - Upgrade JackNJI11 to improve error handling in FindObjects and work with cloudHSM with more than 1024 key pairs

ECA-11882 - Create RA side cache for MSAE Key Exchange Certificate

ECA-11894 - Language update by David Carella

ECA-11913 - Exchange certificate DN should be based on issuers CN

ECA-11914 - Allow non-Bouncycastle keypairs to be recovered from SOAP APIs

ECA-11939 - Add a feature toggle presigned OCSP responses upon issuance & revocation generation

ECA-11943 - Force reload cached JS and CSS files when EJBCA version changes

ECA-11961 - Fix testRedactionPatterns test in CE

ECA-11984 - L10n: Add Document-Signing EKU in RA GUI (English)

Bug Fixes

ECA-10858 - EE profile change in RA web

ECA-11665 - Can not use PEM cert download in RA Web if key recovery is enabled

ECA-11729 - BE Publisher - we can add any property via REST

ECA-11818 - End Entity is being updated even when nothing was changed

ECA-11825 - NPE when trying to import CA certificate response when MS CA compatibility is enabled

ECA-11828 - IllegalStateException when starting EJBCA with MS CA compatibility enabled and cryptotoken auto-activation disabled

ECA-11842 - RA - only key algorithm section is visible

ECA-11847 - FE RA - unify fields in end entity.

ECA-11855 - FE PeerConnector - cancel works like save

ECA-11861 - Add/Remove buttons in EST View mode are clickable

ECA-11865 - Configdump import fails for /endentityprofilesrules/profileName/keyrecovery/

ECA-11871 - Restore ca.keyspec that was accidentally removed from install.properties.sample

ECA-11893 - ejbca-db-cli verify broken - no such provider BC

ECA-11896 - Regression: CrlStoreSessionBean.getLastCRLInfoLightWeight gives exception using Oracle Database

ECA-11905 - Allow non-Bouncycastle keypairs to be recovered from RA GUI

ECA-11915 - RA certificate search timeout returns "No results"

ECA-11916 - List of Vendor CAs in EST alias is not sorted

ECA-11925 - Edit CMP Alias page displays RA Name Generation Prefix/Postfix on Client Mode

ECA-11926 - Only KEC enabled certificate profiles must be shown in drop down in MSAE alias

ECA-11927 - AWX configdump import failure due to missing yaml key (should not be mandatory)

ECA-11946 - Relapsed - MSAE Alias - Removing template mapping always removes the top row

ECA-11954 - Fix missing ConfigDump default value for "Fortanix Base Address" in CryptoTokens

ECA-11955 - Fix NullPointerException in EjbcaWS method "createExternallySignedCa" when caProperties = null

ECA-11956 - Exception when trying to add an alias

ECA-11960 - Allow recovery for usergenerated tokens only if they are marked for recovery

ECA-11968 - isDeltaCrl flag in storeCrl in CertificateCrlReader is set incorrectly

ECA-11975 - Regression: Could not find key 'CMP_ALIAS/.extendedvalidation'

ECA-11977 - Log Redact ui bug in approvals for key recovery

ECA-11982 - Fix CMP alias UI - distorted vendor mode fields

ECA-11983 - RA Web Make New Request UI Bug

ECA-11986 - Make RA Web certificate search backwards compatible with older CA versions