A Digital Certificate is a special document provided by a reliable authority
(referred to as a Certificate Authority, or CA), that establishes the
credentials of a business or institution on the Internet. Guided by the
SSL protocol, the Digital Certificate connects the
owner's identity with a public key, which is accessible by anyone. In a secure
session in a web browser over the Internet, this can be used to validate the
merchant or business entity, since this certificate can be validated only by its
corresponding private key, present only with the certificate owner.
Digital certificates can be used for a
variety of transactions, although their usage has been most prominent in
E-commerce. Essentially, it certifies that a
business is indeed connected with a particular website, thus providing an online
identification method.
To a consumer, it provides the assurance that the online
transaction he is indulging in, is actually being promoted by a genuine business
or institution. The certificate thus establishes a secure path between the
merchant and the consumer.