I asked for thawte personal email certificate. Registration process is localized, so I see it now in the Czech language. After choosing password, and at least 5 security questions was sent email with values Probe and Ping, so it was possible to finish registration process without any problems. Page for personal certificate maintenance is https://www.thawte.com/cgi/personal/contents.exe, user ID is chosen email address in CAPITAL LETTERS. Nice overview description of all process is at http://regionaltraffic.co.uk/secure_email.html
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thawte offers a very simple but powerful “extranet certification” system which enables organizations to certify their partners, customer, suppliers or employees, and to use these certificates for access control to secure web servers. The “Strong Extranet” is the easiest way to migrate from username/password access control to certificate-based access control.
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Public Key
Your Personal Certificate will contain a public key. People will use that public key to encrypt information for your eyes only. If the drop-down listbox below does not include 1024-bit keys, then you should update your browser to full-strength crypto by downloading a new browser from Netscape. If for some reason you cannot do that, then try installing Fortify to upgrade your browser to full-strength crypto.
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The certificate will have a distinguished name that looks like this:
| Common: | Thawte Freemail Member |
If you need a certificate with your full name in it, then you need to join the Freemail Web of Trust.
It may also include at least the following extensions:
X.509 SubjectAltName
This certificate contains a set of alternative names for the certificate subscriber. They are listed below:
- Email: user@example.com
Please note that we will also add a BasicConstraints, and ExtendedKeyUsage and an authorityKeyIdentifier.
If you have been certified as a member of any extranets the relevant identities will appear below. Check those you wish to include into this certificate.
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TERMS OF USE FOR THAWTE PERSONAL CERTIFICATION AND WEB OF TRUST SERVICES
Note! You must read these “Terms of Use for thawte Personal Certification and Web of Trust Services” before applying for, accepting, or using any thawte Personal Email Certificate (hereinafter “certificate”). If you do not agree to all of these terms and conditions, then do not apply for, accept, or use such certificate(s). By clicking “Agree” below or by accepting or using a certificate, you agree to be bound by these terms and conditions, which constitute a legal agreement between you and thawte (hereinafter “agreement”).
You must be at least 13 years of age to participate. If you are at least 13 years old, but under 18, parental permission is required and all references to “you” shall include your parent(s). By clicking “Agree” below, you confirm that (a) you are at least 13 years old, (b) you obtained parental consent if you are under 18, and (c) you are otherwise legally capable and able to enter into this agreement.
All references to “thawte” in this agreement shall mean thawte, Inc., a Delaware corporation located at 487 E. Middlefield Road, Mountain View, CA 94043, USA, unless you are located in the Republic of South Africa, the Republic of Namibia, the Kingdom of Lesotho, or the Kingdom of Swaziland, in which case all references to “thawte” herein shall mean thawte Consulting (Pty) Ltd., a South African company located at Table Bay Building, Tygerberg Hills Office Park, 163 Hendrik Verwoerd Drive, Plattekloof, 7500 Cape Town, South Africa.
This agreement and the entire enrollment process contain a lot of text. They are purposed to keep you fully informed about our practices and procedures so that you may make an informed decision about whether or not to participate. It is very important that you take the time to read this agreement very carefully. If you have questions, feel free to contact us at legal@thawte.com.
:: About Personal Certificates ::
A personal certificate is a form of electronic credential for the Internet, used to sign digital messages like email. It allows you to digitally sign and encrypt your emails to help increase the level of security for transmission of your outbound emails (of course, nothing on the Internet is entirely secure). Further, those communicating with you will be able to verify ? with a higher degree of certainty, albeit not complete security ? that mail coming from your email address is in fact from your email address. Once you exchange certificates with your friends or business partners, you can correspond over the Internet with additional protection for your privacy. The role of thawte in this process is that of a private certification provider (we refer to this role as “Certification Authority” or “CA”, but it does not mean that we are officially accredited as such by government entities). As a CA, we issue certificates to consumers and businesses and almost all existing Internet browsers in use today recognize our certificates. thawte’s Personal Certification and Web of Trust Services are governed by thawte’s Certification Practice Statement (“CPS”), which sets out practices and procedures that we must adhere to in our role as a CA. The CPS is publicly available at www.thawte.com/cps and is incorporated by reference into this agreement. You must use thawte certificates and any related service only in accordance with this agreement and the thawte CPS.
:: Information We Gather from You ::
If you decide to participate, your relationship with thawte, your Certification Authority, is one of trust. In order to do our job effectively we need to know a certain amount of information about you. We ask for your personal information for the limited purposes of creating your certificate(s), providing the services that accompany your certificate(s), and authenticating your identity in order to issue you certificate(s). Depending on the extent of your participation, we may ask for the following information during the enrollment process:
– Your national identification number, passport number, driver license number or tax number, depending on your nationality.
– Your full name and date of birth.
– Your employer’s name, size and address (if you are employed).
– Your home address and contact details.
– Your preferred currency.
We realize that some people will not want to divulge this sort of personal information for fear of identity theft or other reasons. We respect your decision and do not encourage you to participate if you are not comfortable with our practices and procedures. For further information on how thawte processes personal information, please refer to thawte’s Privacy Statement, which is publicly available at www.thawte.com/legal/privacy.html.
:: How We Use and With Whom We Share the Information We Gather ::
We will use the information you supply to us to issue certificate(s) to you as a Certification Authority. Please note that all information you provide that forms the content of a certificate may be published. Publication of certificate information in a publicly accessible location enables third parties (that is, the public at large) to access, review, and rely upon them. You should have no expectation of privacy regarding the content of your certificate(s). Further, you should be aware that the personal information you supply may be accessed by others for the limited purpose of validating your identity. For example, when you first enroll for a certificate, your name will not appear on the certificate?rather, it will read, “thawte Freemail Member”. To add your name to your certificate, you must have your identity validated by a thawte Web of Trust Notary (“WOT Notary”). This validation process requires a face-to-face meeting with a thawte WOT Notary, who will confirm your identity by accessing your personal information through the thawte website and comparing that information against the photo-identity document that you must present to him or her. The WOT Notary may be required to keep, for up to five years, copies of the identification documents that you present in the event thawte performs an audit on your validation. (You should be aware that a WOT Notary is not necessarily a licensed public notary, but rather a “regular” individual who is not affiliated with thawte except for his or her participation in this program, akin to your participation should you decide to join. WOT Notaries perform validation functions as a volunteer at his or her own free will and s/he is not an agent of thawte and is therefore not authorized to act on behalf of thawte. thawte therefore disclaims any liability which may arise from the actions of WOT Notaries.) Finally, please note that we may disclose your personal information to local, state, federal, national or international government or law enforcement authorities if we are required by law to do so.
:: How You Can Update or Correct Your Information::
If any of your information contained in your certificate is or becomes incorrect, you can always cancel/revoke your certificate (see additional information in the next paragraph) and apply for a new one with the correct information. We cannot, however, update or correct information contained in your certificate without destroying the integrity of the certificate because we digitally sign each certificate as a part of the certificate issuance process. If we were to subsequently modify or remove any information listed in a certificate, our digital signature would not verify the certificate’s new content. Furthermore, if a subscriber (sender) then digitally signed a message with his or her private key, a third party would not be able to properly verify the sender’s signature (created using the sender’s private key) because the sender’s certificate would have been altered after the key pair’s creation. If you would like to update or correct any information in our records that is not contained in your certificate, please visit https://www.thawte.com/cgi/personal/general/editinfo.exe.
:: How You Can (and We Can) Revoke (Deactivate) Your Certificate ::
A third party relying on your certificate may want to know its status (for example, whether it is valid or revoked). thawte therefore does not generally delete certificates (and their content) from its database because a third party might not then be able to check its status. You may, however, revoke your certificate. A revoked certificate will still appear in our database with an indication that it has been revoked. If you would like to have your certificate revoked from our database, please visit https://www.thawte.com/cgi/personal/cert/revoke.exe and follow the listed instructions. thawte also reserves the right to terminate this agreement and/or revoke your certificate at any time, for any or no reason, at our sole discretion, without notice and effective immediately (after all, it is a free service). For example, we will revoke the Certificate if we determine that you have engaged in activities that, in our opinion, are harmful to the system or to the thawte brand.
:: Additional Conditions of Use ::
This agreement shall take effect upon your completion of the enrollment process. So long as you abide by the terms in this agreement and thawte has not terminated this agreement or revoked your certificate, thawte gives you permission to access and utilize the Personal Certification and Web of Trust system for the sole purpose of receiving the certificate services described above. Except, of course, for the personal information that you supply to thawte, all intellectual property used in the Personal Certification and Web of Trust system remains the property of thawte and nothing in this agreement gives you any right or interest to it. Although thawte does not charge a fee for personal certificates, this is not a test system. If you proceed with your enrollment, you must do so in good faith. If you submit false information or mis-use the system or any data in any manner, you will be subject to personal claims and your employer may also be subject to claims if it is proven that your employer was cognizant of your actions. You shall also be responsible for reimbursing thawte if thawte incurs any liability from your breach of this agreement. Please do not toy with this service. Please only enroll in the system once. We do not permit multiple profiles. Please also submit your information carefully. Once we process them, they cannot be changed. Finally, you should be aware of additional program rules and guidelines that are published in the Personal Certification and the Web of Trust web portal. These rules and guidelines are incorporated by reference into this agreement and you must therefore abide by them as if they are listed in this agreement itself.
:: Disclaimers and Limitation of Liability ::
THAWTE MAKES NO EXPRESS WARRANTY OR REPRESENTATION REGARDING THIS SERVICE OR THE QUALITY OR CONTINUED AVAILABILITY OF THE CERTIFICATES, AND THAWTE HEREBY DISCLAIMS ANY IMPLIED WARRANTIES AND REPRESENTATIONS, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NON-INFRINGEMENT.
TO THE FULLEST EXTENT LEGALLY PERMISSIBLE, THAWTE’S TOTAL AND AGGREGATE LIABILITY TO YOU UNDER ANY LEGAL THEORY, INCLUDING, WITHOUT LIMITATION, CONTRACT, TORT AND STATUTE, SHALL BE LIMITED AS FOLLOWS, WHETHER OR NOT THE LIMITED WARRANTIES PROVIDED HEREIN FAIL OF THEIR ESSENTIAL PURPOSE AND WHETHER OR NOT THAWTE WAS ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES: THAWTE SHALL HAVE NO LIABILITY FOR ANY INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, INCIDENTAL OR SPECIAL DAMAGES, LOST PROFITS, LOST DATA OR LOST BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES. THAWTE’S LIABILITY FOR ANY DIRECT DAMAGES CAUSED BY NEGLIGENCE TO YOU SHALL BE LIMITED TO USD$50 (FIFTY UNITED STATES DOLLARS) PER INSTANCE AND IN THE AGGREGATE; OTHERWISE, THAWTE’S LIABILITY FOR DIRECT DAMAGES SHALL BE DISCLAIMED ENTIRELY TO THE FULLEST EXTENT PERMITTED UNDER APPLCIABLE LAW.
EXCEPT AS EXPRESSLY PROVIDED OTHERWISE IN THIS AGREEMENT, YOUR SOLE AND EXCLUSIVE REMEDY FOR ANY BREACHES SHALL BE YOUR RIGHT TO TERMINATE THIS AGREEMENT AND YOUR USE OF THE SERVICES AND CERTIFICATE.
:: Governing Law, Dispute Resolution and Jurisdiction ::
This agreement and any dispute arising out of or in connection with this agreement shall be (a) governed by California law, excluding conflicts of law principles, and (b) subject to final and binding arbitration. The commercial arbitration rules of the American Arbitration Association (“AAA”) shall apply and proceedings shall be conducted under the auspices of the AAA in Mountain View, California, in the English language by three arbitrators. Notwithstanding the foregoing, either party may apply for injunctive relief (but not damages or other remedies) in any competent jurisdiction worldwide.
:: Informed Consent ::
Having been duly informed of the treatment of your personal information and the risks associated with participating and using thawte certificates, you hereby give your consent to thawte as follows:
1.You agree that others may, through thawte’s Web of Trust web portal, view the personal information you submit.
2.You agree that thawte’s liability and obligations are limited as provided in this agreement.
3.You agree that you are restricted from participating if the laws of your country prohibit you from doing so (for example, if you are not allowed to provide the types of personal information that thawte requires, or if you are prohibited from participating in certain Internet activity). If you decide to participate, you warrant to thawte that you are not in violation of the laws of your country and that you will not cause thawte to violate laws of your jurisdiction due to your participation.
4.You agree that you are participating voluntarily and at your own risk and therefore you warrant to thawte that you will not hold thawte responsible for any liability that may arise from your participation, except as expressly provided otherwise in this agreement.
You understand that if you do not give your consent, thawte cannot provide you with the certification services set forth above. If you agree with all of the above, please proceed by clicking on the “AGREE” button below. If you disagree with all or any of the above, please click the “DO NOT AGREE” button and your enrollment will be terminated.
Terms of Use for thawte Personal Certification and Web of Trust Services v. 2.0 (06-05)