DigiCert: A Certificate Authority with excellent customer service

by Bharat Suneja

I finally took the plunge and decided to get a certificate from a public Certificate Authority (CA) for my Exchange Server 2007 server at home. A certificate that supports Subject Alternative Names (SAN certificate, aka “Unified Communications” certificate), no less. Having dealt with a number of CAs in the past, and having heard some horror stories about getting a certificate that supports Subject Alternative Names, I wasn’t quite looking forward to the exercise.

Thanks to Office Communications Server (OCS) MVP (and fellow Zenpriser till recently… ) Lee Mackey, the CA he recommended – DigiCert – provided exemplary customer service.

Chain of events:
– Generate SAN certificate request using the New-ExchangeCertificate command from Exchange Server 2007 (for a couple of domains, includes the Autodiscover.domain.com fqdn).
– Submit request to DigiCert
– Get confirmation emails from DigiCert (for multiple domains)
– Within a few seconds, while I’m still clicking on the confirmation messages, I get a call from a DigiCert rep to confirm the details
– The rep informs me the physical/mailing address with the domain registrar for one of the domains is not current or not the same as the one I provided when requesting the cert
– Rep waits while I correct it on the domain registrar’s web site
– Confirms the address is updated in the registrar’s WHOIS info
– Asks for a photo ID to be uploaded on their secure site
– I email him the photoID instead of uploading it
– By the time I’m back from the scanner/copier to my desk, and hit refresh, the photo ID shows up on DigiCert’s web site
– Within a few minutes I get the certificate in by email
– Install certificate and test it with the different domains – works!

An impressive and positive customer service experience – these guys rock! If you’re in the market for a digital certificate, check them out.

Requesting and using certificates for Exchange Server 2007

ISA Server issues

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