Trustico Explained

Trustico
Type:Private company
Hq Location City:Croydon
Hq Location Country:United Kingdom
Industry:Internet security, Public key infrastructure

Trustico is a dedicated SSL certificate provider, They are headquartered in the United Kingdom.

History

The company was founded in 2006 in United Kingdom by Zane Lucas. They gradually spread around the world over the following years. The firm currently operates entirely in the selling of SSL Certificates.

On 22 June 2017 Trustico entered a Partnership with Comodo, a developer of cyber security solutions and digital certificates.[1] [2]

The company became notable in March 2018, after its CEO transferred the private keys for 23,000 HTTPS certificates via email (a non-secure protocol) to an executive at DigiCert.[3] [4] [5] [6] The fact that these private keys had been stored by Trustico suggested that Trustico had been violating the baseline requirements for certificate authorities.

This was followed by the disclosure of a critical security flaw – a publicly accessible root shell – in the Trustico website, after which the website was taken offline.[7] [8] The result was that thousands of Trustico customers had their security certificates revoked by DigiCert.[6]

Products

Controversies

Symantec abandonment, 2018

Following Google's statement, on 11 September 2017, to distrust Symantec's SSL Certificates for unsatisfactory security standards.[9] Trustico followed suit in abandoning Symantec issued SSL Certificates.[10] [11] Trustico offered replacements to all Symantec CA Certificates issued between June 2016 and December 2017 in compensation for those affected by the abandonment.

DigiCert and Trustico spat, 2018

On 2 February Trustico sent an email to DigiCert requesting the revocation of all Symantec Certificates - around 50,000 - managed by DigiCert. DigiCert, who had recently acquired Symantec's[12] [13] [14] CA business denies the request to mass-revoke the certificates. On 25 February DigiCert terminated its contract with Trustico after Trustico said it would seek a legal opinion on the matter.[15]

On 27 February DigiCert released a statement claiming they had received an email from Trustico containing over 23,000 private keys before mass emailing Trustico's customers about the security breach.

See also

Notes and References

  1. Comodo and Trustico Team Up in Strategic Worldwide Partnership. www.prnewswire.com. en. 2018-09-24.
  2. News: Strategic global partnership announced between Comodo and Trustico - News @ WebHosting.info. 2017-06-23. News @ WebHosting.info. 2018-09-24. en-US.
  3. Web site: 23,000 HTTPS certificates axed after CEO emails private keys. 2018.
  4. Web site: Trustico compromises own customers' HTTPS private keys in spat with partner. Zack. Whittaker. .
  5. Web site: 23,000 Digital Certificates Revoked in DigiCert-Trustico Spat - SecurityWeek.Com. www.securityweek.com. March 2018 .
  6. Web site: 23,000 HTTPS certs will be axed in next 24 hours after private keys leak. The Register. 11 September 2018.
  7. Web site: Trustico website goes dark after someone drops critical flaw on Twitter. 2018.
  8. Web site: HTTPS cert flingers Trustico, SSL Direct go TITSUP after website security blunder blabbed. .
  9. News: Chrome's Plan to Distrust Symantec Certificates. Google Online Security Blog. 2018-09-24. en-US.
  10. News: Trustico abandons Symantec SSL certificates -. 2018-02-19. Enterprise Times. 2018-09-24. en-GB.
  11. News: Trustico Abandons Symantec SSL Certificates. 2018-09-24. en.
  12. News: Distrust of the Symantec PKI: Immediate action needed by site operators. Google Online Security Blog. 2018-09-24. en-US.
  13. News: Symantec to sell SSL certificate and PKI business to DigiCert. 2017-08-03. Comodo News and Internet Security Information. 2018-09-24. en-US.
  14. News: Symantec Sells SSL Business to DigiCert for $950M in Cash and 30% Shares. BleepingComputer. 2018-09-24. en-us.
  15. News: 23,000 Users Lose SSL Certificates in Trustico-DigiCert Spat. BleepingComputer. 2018-09-24. en-us.