Comodo SecureEmail
Certificates
Certificate Settings
The certificate settings area provides fast, centralized management of the email certificates installed on your machine. From here you can:
- Inspect your own installed email certificates to find out details such as expiry date;
- Find out whether or not you have a recipients certificate installed on your system;
- Easily import, remove and view certificates;
- Sign up for a free Comodo email certificate;
- Revoke your Comodo email certificate;
- Quickly Access the full Windows certificate store from within the SecureEmail interface;
- Configure for automatic addition of all your installed certificates into your Global Address List (GAL) in Microsoft Exchange account.
My Certificates Tab
This tab displays all your personal email certificates. Certificates listed in the 'My Certificates Tab' can be used to digitally sign any email messages you send out to your contacts. If your email certificate is installed on other peoples systems, then they can use it to encrypt any messages they send to you. If this tab is empty, then you should click the 'Sign Up' button to download and install a free Comodo email certificate. For full details on this fast and easy process, please see 'Certificate Sign Up Wizard'.
Right Click Options
Right clicking on a certificate in the list displays a context sensitive menu, which enable you to:
- View - View the details of the certificate;
- Remove - Remove the certificate from the certificate store. The removed certificates cannot be used for digitally signing or encrypting an email;
- Revoke - Starts the Certificate Revocation Wizard for revoking the selected certificate. Click here for more details;
- Import - Starts the Certificate Import wizard. Click here for more details.
Other People’s Certificates Tab
This tab displays other people's email certificates that are installed on your system. You can use the certificates listed in this tab to encrypt any mail that you send to that particular contact. If you do not have their certificate installed then you can still encrypt using a single-use certificate - a feature unique to Comodo SecureEmail. 
Right Click Options
Right clicking on a certificate in the list displays a context sensitive menu, which enables you to:
- View - View the details of the certificate;
- Remove - Remove the certificate from the certificate store. The removed certificates cannot be used for digitally signing or encrypting an email;
- Import - Starts the Certificate Import wizard. Click here for more details.
Certificate Sign Up Wizard
Click the 'Sign Up' button to apply for a free Comodo email certificate. The wizard simplifies the whole application procedure and can be completed in minutes - requiring you to enter only your name and email address. For a complete overview of this process, see 'Certificate Sign Up Wizard'.
Import Certificates into the Personal or Other People store
Comodo SecureEmail automatically imports your and other people's certificates into the appropriate store as soon as it detects them. However, there are situations when users will want to manually import certificates into the store. SecureEmail has a built in wizard that simplifies this usually complex procedure:
1. Click the 'Import' button to launch the Certificate Import Wizard. Alternatively right click inside the certificate list in the 'My Certificates Tab' or 'Other People' tab and select 'Import' from the context sensitive menu. Clear instructions are provided throughout this wizard to guide you through the process. Click 'Next' to continue.
2. Click the 'Browse' button to locate the certificate, select it and click 'Open'. Click 'Next' to continue. 
3. If the private key on the certificate is password protected (a highly recommended practice) you will need to enter it before continuing.
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Note: you should only see the request for a password when you are importing into the 'My Certificates Tab' email store. This is because certificates in this store are used to digitally sign outgoing messages - and in order to do that, SecureEmail needs to access the private key of the certificate. It is a fundamental principle of PKI based security systems that the private key of your certificate is known and available only to you - so it is absolutely critical that your private key is password protected. |
4. Select the certificate store for your certificate. It can be selected automatically (recommended for most users) or manually.
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Note: If the certificate you are installing has a private key then this means it is a personal certificate and will be imported into the 'My Certificates' store and made available for digitally signing your email messages. If there is no private key with the certificate it is a contact's certificate and will be imported into the 'Other People's' store so you can encrypt messages to that contact. |
5. Check the settings you have specified and Click 'Finish' to complete the import process.
6. The next step is to set the security level for the imported item like private key or public key of the certificate. The item for which the security level is to be set and the preset security level will be displayed.
- To continue with the preset level, click OK. The process will move to step 7.
- To change the security level, click 'Set Security Level'...
... and select the security level as required.
High - Enables you to set a password for the private key imported with this certificate. You will be asked for confirmation and asked to enter this password whenever the imported item is to be used for digitally signing or encrypting an email. 
- Type a new password in the 'Password' text box and confirm it by retyping it in the 'Confirm' text box..
- Click 'Finish'. The process will move to step 6.
- Click OK to continue.
Medium - You will be asked for confirmation whenever the imported item is to be used for digitally signing or encrypting an email.
- Click 'Finish'. The process will move to step 6.
- Click OK to continue.
7. The pop-up window shows you that import was successful.
- Click 'OK'. Depending on the store you imported to, the certificate will now be visible in the 'My Certificates Tab' or 'Other People' lists.
Certificate Manager
The 'Certificate Manager...' button opens the full Windows certificate store within the SecureEmail interface - allowing fast, centralized management of every certificate type installed on your computer. Apart from the 'My Certificates Tab' and 'Other People's' tabs, the Certificate Manager also displays intermediary CA certificates; trusted root certificates and trusted and untrusted publishers. You can see the exact same thing in Internet Explorer by browsing to: Tools > Internet options > Content > Certificates.
The full certificate manager allows you to perform all the import/remove/inspect functionality available via Certificate Settings as well as additional options such as exporting certificates and other advanced options.
Global Address List
Comodo SecureEmail can automatically add new certificates installed with Comodo SecureEmail for your Microsoft Exchange Server Account in your system to the Global Address List. Adding new certificates into GAL allows all the other users of GAL to send encrypted mails to you. Comodo recommends to keep this option selected.
This is more useful for network administrators as CSE automates the installation of new certificates from all the users in the network, without the requirement of the users to individually add the certificate through Outlook, each time they install a certificate.
To configure SecureEmail to automatically add the certificates in the GAL
Select the check box 'Automatically add installed certificates for Exchange accounts into GAL'.
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Important Note:
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Comodo SecureEmail User Guide | © 2010 Comodo Security Solutions Inc. | All Rights Reserved.