It's to be used for signing or certifying documents. This is in a Windows context btw.

In the use case I was shown, a form, either paper or a fillable PDF, is issued for the dispensing of dangerous chemical compounds in a pharma research context. The digital cert is used to sign/cert the doco to ensure that no unauthorised changes are made. e.g. form is signed for the issue of 1mg and then end-user changes the form to 10mg.

On 30 May 2014 09:34, Brian May <brian@microcomaustralia.com.au> wrote:

On 30 May 2014 09:14, Colin Fee <tfeccles@gmail.com> wrote:

A colleague has asked if anyone still uses and purchases personal digital certs, the kind you'd buy from Thawte and the like?
(assuming you mean X509 certificate)

What would you do with a personal digital certificate?

I don't think the idea really caught on.

There is email, however GPG seems to be the more popular approach.

I think it is still possible to get them however.
--
Brian May <brian@microcomaustralia.com.au>

--
Colin Fee
tfeccles@gmail.com