Sectigo - Experts & Thought Leaders

Sectigo, a pioneer in digital certificates and automated Certificate Lifecycle Management (CLM), and Altron Security, a pioneering provider of holistic identity and digital security solutions in South Africa, now announced a strategic channel partnership.  This collaboration enables Altron Security to leverage Sectigo's cloud-native CLM solutions to further strengthen its digital certificate management offering for customers, ultimately mitigating the risk of business outages due to mismanaged certificates, improving overall security and helping future proof businesses for the quantum era.  Sectigo’s acquisition Sectigo’s acquisition of the Entrust public certificate business has shown a direct alliance with Altron Security Sectigo’s acquisition of the Entrust public certificate business has established a direct partnership with Altron Security, ensuring the continued provision of trusted CLM solutions for transitioning Entrust customers. The structured migration plan from Entrust to Sectigo minimises disruption and supports affected customers throughout the transition. SSL/TLS certificates and PKI solutions "We look forward to collaborating with Altron Security as we expand our footprint in South Africa,” said Jairo Fraile, vice president of global partner sales at Sectigo. “This partnership reinforces our dedication to providing trusted and compliant SSL/TLS certificates and PKI solutions. By working closely with Altron Security, we are ensuring that customers experience a smooth migration process to Sectigo while benefiting from our range of offerings." Sectigo’s flagship product Through this alliance, Altron Security can now offer Sectigo’s flagship product, Sectigo Certificate Manager With the exponential growth in digital certificate usage, the industry faces a significant challenge: the shortening of certificate lifespans. The shift from 398-day certificate renewals to 47-day poses substantial risks for organisations lacking an automation strategy for their PKI environments. Through this partnership, Altron Security can now offer Sectigo’s flagship product, Sectigo Certificate Manager, which delivers the necessary automation and security to prevent certificate lapses, ensuring businesses stay compliant and secure in an ever-evolving digital landscape. Advanced CLM solutions "We are excited to partner with Sectigo, a globally recognised Certificate Authority renowned for its industry leadership,” said Andrew Whittaker, managing director at Altron Security. “Sectigo's significant presence in the CA/Browser Forum underscores its commitment to upholding the highest security standards, ensuring the delivery of trusted and compliant SSL/TLS certificates." "With the shortening of certificate lifespans and increasing security challenges presented by the quantum era, this partnership allows us to provide advanced CLM solutions to the market, empowering businesses to navigate evolving cybersecurity demands confidently.” Altron Security’s overall strategy This partnership with Sectigo builds on Altron Security’s overall strategy in several key ways: Strengthening Market Leadership in Digital Trust: For over 15 years, Altron Security has been the pioneer in South Africa in delivering digital trust solutions. Partnering with Sectigo allows Altron Security to further expand and solidify its position as a pioneer in this field. This collaboration builds on Altron Security’s innovative SSL/TLS certificates and PKI offerings that meet rigorous industry standards, addressing both security and compliance requirements effectively. Expanding Cybersecurity Portfolio: Sectigo Certificate Manager brings deeper automation and faster scalability to Altron Security’s digital certificate management offering. This partnership enables businesses to reduce operational strain, mitigate risks, and maintain compliance with evolving cybersecurity demands. Enhancing Customer Experience & Trust: The transition from Entrust to Sectigo represents an opportunity to deepen customer relationships. By ensuring a smooth migration process and delivering long-term stability through Sectigo’s trusted certificate authority services, combined with Altron Security’s unparallelled support and customer service, this partnership reaffirms the shared focus on providing reliable, scalable, and secure digital solutions tailored to diverse industry needs.

Sectigo, a pioneer in digital certificates and Certificate Lifecycle Management (CLM), announced that the company has joined the Pax8 Marketplace, the pioneering cloud commerce marketplace. The partnership introduces Sectigo’s automated, cloud-native CLM solution – Sectigo Certificate Manager for Partners – to Pax8’s network of nearly 40,000 MSPs, marking the first time CLM is available in the Marketplace. SSL/TLS certificates MSPs in the Pax8 network can discover, manage, and automate their clients’ SSL/TLS certificates MSPs in the Pax8 network can now discover, manage, and automate their customers’ SSL/TLS certificates within a single dashboard, removing the complexity behind manual certificate management. The partnership unearths opportunities for channel partners to increase cost efficiencies and encourage customer retention, while significantly reducing the risk of their customers experiencing business interruptions due to mismanaged certificates. Use of digital certificates As businesses accelerate their digital transformation efforts, the use of digital certificates is growing exponentially, leading to an increase in certificate renewals. Organisations globally need to prepare for the industry’s shift to shorter certificate validity periods, which will increase certificate renewals up to 12 times a year, a major challenge for organisations using manual management methods. By partnering with Pax8, Sectigo enables MSPs to seamlessly automate and streamline certificate renewal processes and future-proof systems against evolving cybersecurity challenges, all within a centralised dashboard. Pax8 Marketplace Sectigo enables MSPs to automate and simplify certificate renewal methods and future-proof systems “Sectigo and Pax8 recognise that expired certificates due to manual tracking or human error can expose businesses to security risks, downtime, loss of customer trust, and financial and reputational damage,” said Jairo Fraile, vice president of global partner sales at Sectigo. “We are proud to have been fast-tracked as the first automated Certificate Lifecycle Management solution available in the Pax8 Marketplace. We look forward to empowering thousands of forward-thinking MSPs with an enterprise-grade solution for SMBs to ultimately help future-proof their business with shorter certificate lifespans on the horizon.” Key advantages of the Pax8 partnership Sectigo Certificate Manager for Partners is a comprehensive CLM solution that eliminates the manual burdens associated with certificate management by automating the processes of issuance, installation, renewal and management of public SSL/TLS certificates through the ACME protocol. Key advantages of the Pax8 partnership for MSPs include:  Eliminates the risk of business outages: Organisations that rely on manual certificate management are already at risk due to human error. With shorter certificate lifespans on the horizon, CLM automation eliminates these concerns while simultaneously strengthening security. Help drive cost efficiencies: MSPs can redeploy critical IT/security resources elsewhere, eliminating scalability bottlenecks, which in turn allow MSPs to service more customers without increasing operational overhead. Grow revenue and customer retention: Unlocks new recurring revenue streams for MSPs and expands the range of services managed on behalf of customers. The result is greater customer retention due to embedded security services. Overall security framework “We are committed to continually enhancing our portfolio of security products for MSPs, empowering them to strengthen their security posture. Automated Certificate Lifecycle Management fills a critical gap and is a key piece of that overall security framework,” said Oguo Atuanya, corporate vice president of vendor experience at Pax8. “We also know MSPs want to work with vendors who are easy to collaborate with. Sectigo checks all these boxes and is the only vendor in the Pax8 Marketplace to deliver cloud-native, automated CLM to our partners.”

Sectigo, a pioneer in digital certificates and automated Certificate Lifecycle Management (CLM), announced the purchase of Entrust’s public certificate business, marking a transformative milestone in the company’s history. This strategic move significantly expands Sectigo’s enterprise business, doubling its footprint and reinforcing its position as a pioneer in delivering trusted digital security solutions. New opportunities for Sectigo The acquisition unlocks new growth options for Sectigo to provide enhanced CLM abilities The acquisition unlocks new growth opportunities for Sectigo to provide enhanced CLM capabilities to a broader customer base while offering a clear path for businesses to prepare for the challenges of shorter certificate lifespans and postquantum cryptography (PQC). "We are excited to welcome Entrust public certificate customers and partners to the Sectigo family. We are committed to providing them with the exceptional support and service that defines our reputation," said Kevin Weiss, chief executive officer at Sectigo. Sectigo’s cloud-native CLM solutions Weiss added: "At Sectigo, we understand that automating certificate management requires focused solutions. That’s why more than 2,700 partners and hundreds of thousands of customers, from SMBs to Fortune 100 global enterprises, trust us to deliver seamless, scalable Certificate Lifecycle Management solutions in today’s rapidly evolving and increasingly complex digital environment." As the internet shifts toward greater automation, shortened certificate lifespans, and quantum cryptography readiness, Sectigo’s cloud-native CLM solutions are uniquely positioned to deliver industry-pioneering value and performance to meet each of those needs. Entrust’s public certificate customers Entrust’s public certificate clients and allies will gain a seamless transition and uninterrupted operations With a proven track record of leadership in public trust and an unwavering commitment to the highest certificate standards—bolstered by a record five chair positions within the CA/Browser Forum—Entrust’s public certificate customers and partners will gain a seamless transition and uninterrupted business operations. Further, Sectigo brings all its customers a decisive edge in quantum preparedness, empowering them to future-proof their businesses against the challenges of tomorrow. Level of service and support  “We have had a long history in the public certificate business, so it was important to us to find the right provider for our customers,” said Todd Wilkinson, president and CEO of Entrust. “Sectigo is a trusted industry pioneer with a strong track record of compliance and hundreds of thousands of customers worldwide." "We are working together to make the transition as easy as possible for our customers and are confident that their reputation as a certificate authority and commitment to delivering a high level of service and support will serve our customers well." Benefits of Sectigo’s platform Sectigo is also committed to working closely with partners to ensure seamless continuity of service This acquisition significantly broadens Sectigo’s total addressable market, reinforcing its vision of being the trusted partner for protecting the digital infrastructures of organisations worldwide.  As a highly reputable CA with a partner-friendly makeup, Sectigo is also committed to working closely with partners to ensure seamless continuity of service while helping them maximise the capabilities and benefits of Sectigo’s platform. Transformative growth opportunity for Sectigo "Certificate Lifecycle Management is an attractive, rapidly growing segment of the identity market, with enduring growth tailwinds and a forecasted market size of greater than $8 billion by 2029," said Travis Pearson, managing director at GI Partners, a private investment firm and the majority shareholder of Sectigo. "This acquisition presents a transformative growth opportunity for Sectigo, positioning the company for substantial expansion and reinforcing its leadership as one of the world’s most trusted certificate authorities."

For many businesses and organisations, the term 'authentication' is synonymous with 'password' or 'multi-factor authentication (MFA)’. However, because today's business ecosystem is complex and stretches across distributed workforces with work from home, BYOD policies, and multiple cloud environments, it is very challenging to efficiently recognise and authenticate identities of people, processes, and devices throughout the enterprise using traditional methods. The problem with passwords For starters, people tend to forget passwords. To make passwords easier to remember, users may store their passwords in a vulnerable file, create passwords using a consistent pattern, or use the same password again and again. If a password is uncovered on one service or from an unprotected spreadsheet, a bad actor could use that same password to access a high-value network, maybe a corporate service or a bank account. Technical problems with password security Not only are passwords easy for today’s hackers to steal, they offer a poor user experience Not only are passwords easy for today’s hackers to steal, they offer a poor user experience and can be a burden to help desks workers. Password security also suffers from a legion of technical problems. For example, if a connected device machine has been infected with screen scraper malware, the malware can gather all visible data, including passwords, and send them back to the bad actor. Captured passwords are commonly sold and purchased in the underground economy, which can lead to a wide range of security problems. The modern way to authenticate - Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) If passwords are too easily intercepted, what is the best certificate authentication approach? The answer is Public Key Infrastructure (PKI)-based authentication, the better option, because it eliminates the password and reduces the time to authenticate. There is no stronger, easier-to-use authentication and encryption solution than the digital identity provided by PKI. Rather than secret-sharing, PKI uses certificates that do all the work behind the scenes, thereby eliminating the burden on users and the human-error accompaniment. PKI works by using an asymmetric cryptographic key pair, consisting of a private key and a public key. These keys function as a pair using incredibly complex cryptographic algorithms to protect identities and data from unauthorised access or use. Public key The public key consists of a long string of apparently random numbers and is used to encrypt a message. This encrypted message can only be decrypted by the associated private key, which is also made of a long string of numbers. This private key is a secret key and is never shared. The key pair is mathematically related, so that whatever is encrypted with a public or private key, can only be decrypted by its corresponding counterpart. Private key The private key is embedded inside the device, on which it sits - on every laptop, phone, IoT device, server and email client The private key is embedded inside the device, on which it sits - on every laptop, phone, IoT device, server and email client. Whenever possible, the private key is stored in a TPM or hardware security module, protecting it from discovery, even if the device is infected with malware or compromised by a hacker. Additionally, the private key would take decades to brute force and the result is that attack attempts fail. The connection between security and usability There is a dynamic relationship between security and usability - the more you try to up the ante on password-based security, the more difficult it becomes to use. The best security investment is one that can be easily deployed and enthusiastically used by employees. Using PKI authentication is both rock solid and seamless to end users. Digital certificates can be easily deployed to every employee device and system using automated tools. Wouldn't it be better and simpler to not have to type in passwords and instead be automatically authenticated and granted proper access? PKI takes us from the stone age of user names and passwords to a better authentication experience.