Report a compromised certificate private key promptly and arrange revocation through the issuer or the authorised Nabtech certificate order. Revocation identifies a certificate that must no longer be trusted; deleting its local file does not notify the issuer.
01 Coordinate the incident
- Identify the affected certificate by issuer, serial number, hostname list and order. Establish whether the same key was copied to other servers or used for additional certificates.
- Contact the certificate provider through an authenticated support route or the issuer's official certificate-problem reporting channel. State that the private key is compromised or suspected compromised.
- Generate a new key in a trusted environment and request replacement certificates. Do not reuse the exposed key.
- Deploy replacements across the affected origins, proxies, mail services and other endpoints. Coordinate with the issuer's revocation requirements without delaying the compromise report.
- Confirm that the intended certificates have been revoked, not merely queued for internal approval, and that every live endpoint presents a replacement.
- Preserve incident evidence, remove exposed copies and correct the access or storage weakness that allowed the disclosure.
Common questions
Do I need to cancel the whole certificate order?
The issuer may support revoking an individual certificate while preserving the order for replacement issuance. Ask which action applies before cancelling a commercial service unnecessarily.
What information should I avoid sending?
Do not attach the compromised private key to an ordinary ticket. Provide the certificate's public identifiers and use the issuer's approved evidence process if more is needed.
Does reissue automatically revoke every previous certificate?
Behaviour depends on the issuer and the type of change. Verify the specific serial numbers and revocation status rather than assuming a successful reissue completed the incident.