Deploying Web Server Certificate for Site Systems that Run IIS

In this post we will see the steps for deploying web server certificate for site systems that run IIS. This is one of the posts out of Deploy PKI Certificates for SCCM 2012 R2 Step by Step Guide. In my previous post we saw the PKI Certificate Requirements for SCCM 2012 R2 and understood much about PKI, the certificates required for SCCM if you are using PKI etc. The next step is to deploy web server certificate for the site systems. You can log in with a root domain administrator account or an enterprise domain administrator account and use this account for all procedures in this example deployment.

Deploying Web Server Certificate for Site Systems that Run IIS

Basically in this post we will be performing the following steps

1) Creating and Issuing the Web Server Certificate Template on the Certification Authority

2) Requesting the Web Server Certificate

3) Configuring IIS to Use the Web Server Certificate

This certificate is used to encrypt data and authenticate the server to clients. It must be installed externally from Configuration Manager on site systems servers that run IIS and that are configured in Configuration Manager to use HTTPS.

Creating and Issuing the Web Server Certificate Template on the Certification Authority

First of all create a security group named SCCM IIS Servers. This group contains the member servers (SCCM site servers) that will run IIS. On the member server that has Certificate Services installed, in the Certification Authority console, right-click Certificate Templates and click Manage to load the Certificate Templates console.

In the results pane, right-click the entry that displays Web Server in the column Template Display Name, and then click Duplicate Template.

Ensure that Windows 2003 Server is selected, and then click OK.

In the Properties of New Template dialog box, on the General tab, enter a template name to generate the web certificates that will be used on Configuration Manager site systems. Click the Subject Name tab, and make sure that Supply in the request is selected.

Click the Security tab, and remove the Enroll permission from the security groups Domain Admins.

Also remove the Enroll permission from the security groups Enterprise Admins.

Click Add, enter SCCM IIS Servers in the text box, and then click OK. Select the Enroll permission for this group, and do not clear the Read permission. Click OK, and close the Certificate Templates Console.

In the Certification Authority console, right-click Certificate Templates, click New, and then click Certificate Template to Issue.

In the Enable Certificate Templates dialog box, select the new template that you have just created, SCCM Web Server Certificate, and then click OK.

Requesting the Web Server Certificate

The steps that we perform now will install the web server certificate on to the member server that runs IIS. Microsoft recommends you to restart the member server that runs IIS. This is just to ensure that the computer can access the certificate template that you created.

Run the mmc.exe command. In the empty console, click File, and then click Add/Remove Snap-in.In the Add or Remove Snap-ins dialog box, select Certificates from the list of Available snap-ins, and then click Add. In the Certificate snap-in dialog box, select Computer account, and then click Next. On Select Computer dialog box, ensure Local computer: (the computer this console is running on) is selected, and then click Finish. In the Add or Remove Snap-ins dialog box, click OK. In the console, expand Certificates (Local Computer), and then click Personal. Right-click Certificates, click All Tasks, and then click Request New Certificate.

On Select Certificate Enrollment Policy page, click Next.

On the Request Certificates page, identify the SCCM Web Server Certificate from the list of displayed certificates, and then click More information is required to enroll for this certificate. Click here to configure settings.

In the Certificate Properties dialog box, in the Subject tab, do not make any changes to the Subject name. This means that the Value box for the Subject name section remains blank. Instead, from the Alternative name section, click the Type drop-down list, and then select DNS. In the Value box, specify the FQDN values that you will specify in the Configuration Manager site system properties, and then click OK to close the Certificate Properties dialog box.

On the Request Certificates page, select SCCM Web Server Certificate from the list of displayed certificates, and then click Enroll.

On the Certificates Installation Results page, wait until the certificate is installed (the status should show Succeeded), and then click Finish.

Configuring IIS to Use the Web Server Certificate

The steps that we perform now will configure IIS to use the web server certificate that we had configured in the above steps. On the member server that has IIS installed, launch the Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager. Expand Sites, right-click Default Web Site, and then select Edit Bindings.

In the Edit Site Binding dialog box, select the certificate that you requested by using the SCCM Web Server Certificates template, and then click OK. You have now configured IIS to use the web server certificate.