Client Certificates

You might have noticed the Client Certificate Authentication group box in Figure 22-7 in "Secure Sockets Layer." If a Web browser uses the SSL3.0/PCT1 protocol (in other words, a URL starting with https:// instead of http://) to connect to a server, and the server requests certification, the browser sends various certification fields to the server.

You can determine the values of the certification fields in the client certificate by using the ClientCertificate collection of the Request object. This collection provides numerous certification fields that are specified in the X.509 standard. Examples of some of the certification fields include user name, company name, issuer name, and the certificate's date of expiration. For more information on working with certificates, see Chapter 23.