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I'm trying to view a website on a computer that I know is genuine. Typically, a warning screen appears in Google Chrome asking whether or not I want to trust the server. However, the page in question is loaded within an iframe element, and Google Chrome simply refuses to load iframe contents if the source is a computer with an invalid SSL certificate.

One solution I've tried (and which works) is to add a new "Certificate Preference" in Keychain Access on my Mac OS X. I know it works, but I don't know why.

So to reiterate my question: What is a "Certificate Preference" in Keychain Access?

magnus
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1 Answers1

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SSL Certificates are used to provide an encrypted connection between your local machine and a server. When that connection is created, your computer shares hidden information in a private key with that remote server in a handshake. To make sure that your machine doesn’t send that information with every server that provides an SSL Certificate, your computer limits valid connections to Certificates that are either signed by an authorized Certificate Signing Authority, or that are manually trusted by your computer.

In Mac OS X, the Keychain Access provides you direct access to modify the trust level of certificates that your machine has come in counter with. There are plenty of already loaded Certificates in the System Certificates, and any manually added certificates are added to your Login Keychain. If set to ‘Use System Defaults’, your machine will use the rule above. Otherwise, setting to ‘Always Trust’ or ‘Never Trust’ will override the defaults respectively.

Matt Plank
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