Finding your Private Key on Different Servers or Control Panels
Linux-Based (Apache, Nginx, LightHttpd)
Windows Operating Systems
Mac OS X
Tomcat
cPanel
WHM
Plesk
Synology NAS DSM
Webmin
VestaCP
DirectAdmin
Webuzo

Create Ca From Private Key
Generate Ca From Private Key West
Generate Ca From Private Keys
Generate Ca From Private Key West

What Is a Private Key?

What Is a Private Key?

Jul 09, 2019 The private key gets generated along with your Certificate Signing Request (CSR). The CSR is submitted to the certificate authority right after you activate your certificate, while the private key must be kept safe and secret on your server or device. Later on, this key is used for installation of your certificate.

You’ve received your SSL Certificate, and now you need to install it.

Firstly, let’s go through some basics. Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) security is about using two unique keys: the Public Key is encrypted within your SSL Certificate, while the Private Key is generated on your server and kept secret.

Jul 09, 2019 The private key gets generated along with your Certificate Signing Request (CSR). The CSR is submitted to the certificate authority right after you activate your certificate, while the private key must be kept safe and secret on your server or device. Later on, this key is.
Jul 25, 2017 Creating CA-Signed Certificates for Your Dev Sites. Now that we’re a CA on all our devices, we can sign certificates for any new dev sites that need HTTPS. First, we create a private key: openssl genrsa -out dev.mergebot.com.key 2048 Then we create a CSR: openssl req -new -key dev.mergebot.com.key -out dev.mergebot.com.csr.

All the information sent from a browser to a website server is encrypted with the Public Key, and gets decrypted on the server side with the Private Key. Together the key pair keeps communication secured, and one key will not work without the other.

How do I get it?

The Private Key is generated with your Certificate Signing Request (CSR). The CSR is submitted to the Certificate Authority right after you activate your Certificate. The Private Key must be kept safe and secret on your server or device, because later you’ll need it for Certificate installation.

Note: all Certificates except Multi-Domains support Private Key generation in your browser. The key is always saved during SSL activation, we never receive this information. That’s why it’s important you save and back it up during the process if you use the in-browser automatic generation method. If the Private Key key file is lost, you’ll need to reissue your Certificate.

Can I generate a new Private Key for my Certificate if I lose the old one?

Yes. You can generate a new private key and CSR, or use the automatic CSR and key generation during Certificate reissue (this option is available for all Certificates except for the Multi-Domains).

What does the Private Key look like?

It looks like a block of encoded data, starting and ending with headers, such as —–BEGIN RSA PRIVATE KEY—– and —–END RSA PRIVATE KEY—–.

You may not get to see this code when generating your CSR. Usually, it gets generated in the background with the CSR, and is automatically saved on your server. The system also fills the corresponding field automatically during installation of your Certificate in some control panels, such as cPanel.

The way this works varies depending on your web server, control panel, or any other tools used for CSR generation. Select the one that applies to you in the following section for specific guidance.

Finding your Private Key on Different Servers or Control Panels

Linux-based (Apache, NGINX, LightHttpd)

Normally, the CSR/RSA Private Key pairs on Linux-based operating systems are generated using the OpenSSL cryptographic engine, and saved as files with “.key” or “.pem” extensions on the server.

But no specific extensions are mandatory for text files in Linux, so the key file may have any name and extension, or no extension at all.

If you remember the whole name of the key file or at least part of it, you can use the following command in your console to find the file and its directory:

The slash symbol in this command implies that the search begins from the root directory of the server. This way you have more file options to view. The name of the file in between the single quotation marks should be the part of the name that you remember. To search for the file by extension, enter “*.key” to view all the files with the “.key” extension on your server.

Tip: often the name of the file corresponds to the domain name it was generated for e.g. “domain_tld.key” or “domain.tld.pem”.

Here’s another useful command that lets you search files by their content:

This command will return the absolute path to the Private Key file if it’s located on your server.

Windows Operating Systems (IIS, Exchange, Small Business server)

Windows servers don’t let you view the Private Key in plain text format. When you import your Certificate via MMC or IIS, the Private Key is bound to it automatically if the CSR/Key pair has been generated on the same server.

If you need to obtain the Private Key to install your Certificate on a different server, you can export the key in a password protected PFX (PKCS#12) file. To do that, open the MMC Certificates snap-in tools following these steps:

Win+R >> mmc.exe >> OK >> File >> Add/Remove Snap-in >> Certificates >> Add >> Computer account >> Next >> Local computer >> Finish >> OK

Create Ca From Private Key

Next, go to Certificate Enrollment Requests >> Certificates (if you haven’t completed the Certificate request yet). If you’ve done that, you’d select Personal >> Certificates, then right-click the Certificate >> select All Tasks >> Export. The Export wizard will open, and give you instructions. You can find more detailed instructions here.

Once that’s done, you will see the .pfx file containing your Certificate, CA-Bundle, and Private Key. To extract the key, use this tool. Choose the PKCS12 to PEM option, then upload the file and enter your chosen password.

Mac OS X

The Keychain tool in the Server application of Mac OS X won’t allow you to access the Private Key via the graphic user interface. Instead use the Terminal, by opening /etc/certificates/ directory and clicking the file.

Its name should be something like “*.key.pem”. And the terminal commands to open the file are: cd /etc/certificates/ , then ls , and sudo nano test.key.pem.

Note: to check if the Private Key matches your Certificate, go here. Then paste the Certificate and the Private Key text codes into the required fields and click Match.

Tomcat

Generate Ca From Private Key West

If your Tomcat SSL connector is configured in JSSE style, the Private Key must be in a password-protected keystore file with a .jks or .keystore extension. This file, unlike most other cases, is created before the CSR. To extract the Private Key, you’ll need to convert the keystore into a PFX file with the following command:

Tips:

“Keystore.jks” should be replaced with your actual keystore name,
“keystore.p12” will be the name of the PKCS12 file you will receive,
<jkskeyalias>, <jkspassword> and <keypassword> are the alias (key and keystore passwords that were entered during keystore generation),
<jkskeyalias>, <jkspassword> and <keypassword> should be replaced with your JKS file alias, its password, and Private Key password.
<newp12password> and <newkeypassword> should be replaced with the passwords you set for your new PKCS12 file and the Private Key.

After the PKCS12 file is generated, you can convert it to a PEM file with separated CRT, CA-Bundle and KEY files using thi