Security of a self-signed certificate

Question

If I verify the fingerprint of a self-signed SSL certificate on the client, can a man-in-the-middle attack still occur?

score 6 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 24 '12 at 02:36

6

Only if they manage to actually reproduce the fingerprint, which is much, much harder.

The Fingerprint is actually the most reliable method of determining a certificate is what it should be. It's just ignored by just about everyone.

answered Mar 24 '12 at 02:36

sysadmin1138

135,853

score 5 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 24 '12 at 02:36

A self signed certificate is just as "secure" as a CA issued certificate given the same cryptographic specifications. All the same vulnerabilities and strengths are there.

The only difference is that clients generally have a preconfigured list of trusted CAs and will not ask, where they'll always initially ask for self-signed. Which it sounds like you're already aware of.

Security of a self-signed certificate

2 Answers2