What Is an AS2 Certificate? Everything You Need to Know

The AS2 certificate is the foundation of secure B2B communication, enabling both encryption (confidentiality) and digital signing (non-repudiation).

The Public/Private Key Pair

An AS2 certificate contains your public key. You share this with your trading partners so they can encrypt data for you and verify signatures from you. Your private key, which must be kept secure, is used locally to decrypt data and create signatures.

Certificate Exchange Workflow

1. You generate a Certificate Signing Request (CSR).
2. You send the CSR to your partner (or CA).
3. They return your signed public certificate.
4. You import their public certificate into your keystore.
5. You import your signed public certificate into their keystore.

This process must be completed for both signing and encryption roles for every partner.