Connectivity Guide

● The intermediate CA downloads and installs the CA certificate. Afterwards, the intermediate CA can sign certificates for
hosts in the network and for other intermediate CAs that are lower in the PKI hierarchy.
● The root and intermediate CA certificates, but not the corresponding private keys, are made publicly available on the
network for network hosts to download.
● Whenever possible, store private keys offline or in a location restricted from general access.
3. OS10 switches generate private keys and create CSRs using the crypto cert generate request command. A switch
uploads a CSR to an intermediate CA. To store the private key in a local hidden location, Dell EMC Networking recommends
using the key-file private parameter with the command.
4. Download and install a CA certificate on a host using the crypto ca-cert install command. After you install a CA
certificate, a host trusts any certificates that are signed by the CA and presented by other network devices. You must
first download a certificate to the home directory, and then install the certificate using the crypto ca-cert install
command.
5. Download and install a signed host certificate and private key from an intermediate CA on an OS10 switch. Then install them
using the crypto cert install command. After you install the host certificate, OS10 applications use the certificate to
secure communication with network devices. The private key is installed in the internal file system on the switch and cannot
be exported or viewed.
Manage CA certificates
OS10 supports the download and installation of public X.509v3 certificates from external certificate authorities.
In a data center environment, trusted CA servers can create CA certificates. A host operates as a trusted CA server. Network
hosts install certificates that are digitally signed with the CA's private key to establish trust between participating devices in the
network. The certificate on an OS10 switch is used to verify the certificates presented by clients and servers, such as Syslog
and RADIUS servers, to establish a secure connection with these devices.
To import a CA server certificate:
1. Use the copy command to download an X.509v3 certificate created by a CA server using a secure method, such as HTTPS,
SCP, or SFTP. Copy a CA certificate to the local directory on the switch, such as home:// or usb://.
2. Use the crypto ca-cert install command to install the certificate. When you install a CA certificate, specify the local
path where the certificate is stored.
The switch verifies the certificate and installs it in an existing directory of trusted certificates in PEM format.
Install CA certificate
● Install a CA certificate in EXEC mode.
crypto ca-cert install ca-cert-filepath [filename]
○ ca-cert-filepath specifies the local path to the downloaded certificate; for example, home://CAcert.pem or
usb://CA-cert.pem.
○ filename specifies an optional filename that the certificate is stored under in the OS10 trust-store directory. Enter the
filename in the filename.crt format.
Example: Download and install CA certificate
OS10# copy scp:///tftpuser@10.11.178.103:/tftpboot/certs/Dell_rootCA1.pem home://
Dell_rootCA1.pem
password:
OS10# crypto ca-cert install home://Dell_rootCA1.pem
Processing certificate ...
Installed Root CA certificate
CommonName = Dell_rootCA1
IssuerName = Dell_rootCA1
Display CA server certificate
OS10# show crypto ca-certs
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| Locally installed certificates |
Security
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