Introduction

There are many cases when you need a certificate installed on your IIS server. A typical example is SSL enabling OWA (Outlook Web Access) for achieving a higher level of security. Another very good example is configuring Forms-based authentication in OWA – it requires the use of SSL.

You have the following two choices:

1. To purchase a certificate
2. To use a self-signed certificate

Most of the instructions which you can find on the Internet describe the procedure for installing first your own certification authority then requesting a certificate and last – installing it.

Here you can see a much easier and straight forward procedure – using the Microsoft “SelfSSL.exe” tool. You just run it, provide the FQDN (Fully Qualified Domain Name) for your IIS server, specify the validity of the certificate and that’s it.

The “SelfSSL.exe” tool is part of the IIS6 resource kit. You can get just the "SelfSSL.exe" tool from here

Step 1: Generate and install a certificate with “SelfSSL.exe”

Watch the below video from netometer.net to learn more about this

Step 2: Test the certificate from a client machine.

Here we demonstrate also how to import the self-signed certificate to the client's Trusted Root Certification Authorities store.

Watch the below video from netometer.net to learn more about this

Related Links:

Create a self-signed SSL certificate with IIS 6.0 Resource Kit SelfSSL

IIS 6.0 Resource Kit Tools (IIS 6.0)