Import of an S/MIME certificate
-
S/MIME Certificate for personal mailboxes or for group mailboxes are sent as a .p12 file. A password must also be available.
- Save and store the certificate file (*.p12) securely, ideally on your OneDrive, as it will be needed again if you change computers or reinstall your notebook.
- Important: For further processing, this file must also be temporarily saved on drive C:!
- Click the Windows button and enter ‘certmgr.msc’ and confirm with Enter.
- This opens the Windows certificate store.
- In the following window, right-click on ‘My certificates’ and click on ‘All tasks’ and ‘Import’ in the context menu.
- The certificate import wizard opens
- Select the previously saved certificate file (*.p12) under ‘Browse’
- Open the file's storage path and select the file:
- In the next step, enter the password for the *.p12 file.
Please activate the options for high security. The checkboxes must be set at points 1 and 3.
- Point 1 ensures that a password request is started when this S/MIME is used.
- Point 3 ensures that the certificate content is stored securely.
- Finally, the certificate store is selected: ‘Own certificates’
- After completing the wizard, a new window appears - in which a new password for the S/MIME certificate must be created.
- The certificate import should now be successfully completed.
Due to the requirements of our S/MIME certificate provider, only S/MIME certificates with a 4096 bit key will be issued.
Technically it is not possible to store certificates with a 4096 bit key on the TPM chip - on which our Virtual Smartcards (VSC) are stored.
The import via the ‘Smart ID Desktop App’ therefore does not work.
Please follow this workaround:
Please note: screenshots below will be updated to an english version later on.
Procedure and positions of buttons do not vary.
Assign a new password with a length of at least eight characters. (upper and lower case letters, numbers, special characters)
Enter the same password again for verification