Mac OS X Extras: Computer Certificate Auto-enrollment

Background

Digital Certificates have an important place in a properly managed enterprise.  From an infrastructure perspective, they can enhance authentication and provide encryption for Ethernet and Wifi Networks.
Centrify for Mac OS X has built-in capabilities to enable 802.1x authentication leveraging Group Policy but it does require that the computer has a digital certificate.

PKI Disclaimer:  As in all PKI-related posts and videos, I make the caveat that Public Key Infrastructure is no joke.  There are policy, people, process, security and technology implications to your enterprise, so all PKI deployments need to provide a high-level of assurance.  You may have landed here due to a google search or reference, feel free to use these posts for testing purposes, but again, when it comes to PKI, any production deployment should conform to best practices.

Centrify uses GPOs to configure computer or user-based 802.1x settings on the Mac OS X platform

Configuring Computer AutoEnrollment for Mac OS X

The Centrify adclient is capable of leveraging Windows certificate auto enrollment with the Microsoft CA. The basic steps are:

On the AD side (with a Domain or Cert Admin)

1. Configure the certificate template based on your needs (using the Certificate Templates MMC)
• Subject  (typically common name based on the User Principal Name)
• Security (set it to an AD group containing your Mac Systems and check to Enroll and AutoEnroll)
• Extensions (add what you need)
  If using it for 802.1x - usage should be Client and Server Authentication.
2. Configure your CA to issue Certificates based on that template (using the Certificate Authority MMC)
3. Modify your GPO to enable the PKI policies for auto-enrollment
   Enabling the Computer Configuration > Windows Settings > Security Settings > Public Key Policies > "Certificate Services Client - Auto-Enrollment Settings" GPO

On the Mac (domain-joined)

1. Flush the cache with adflush (or wait the cache flush interval)  [sudo adflush]
2. Refresh the group policies (with adgpupdate) or wait for the GP refresh interval
3. Verify the Certificates on the Keychain Access app.

Video Lab