Microsoft Certificate Server manages the issuance, revocation, and renewal of digital certificates. The Certificate Server is intended for Web-based applications that require secure and protected user access. With certificate-based authentication, your application can be confident of a client's identity, and clients can also be assured of the application server's identity. Certificates are the basis for secure authenticated communication and access control on the Web.
Certificates make it easy to administer logon accounts: a user must only log on once — after that the browser presents their certificate to multiple sites as needed. The advantage is that user account databases are not required on every server.
Microsoft Certificate Server is a technology for secure communication and access control across public networks. Be sure to look at the documentation to learn how certificate-based authentication integrates into the Windows NT security model.
For More Information For more information on Certificate Server security, search for "Microsoft Certificate Server" in MSDN Library Visual Studio 6.0.