A certificate authority (CA), also sometimes referred to as a certification authority, is a company or organization that acts to validate the identities of entities (such as websites, email addresses, companies, or individual persons) and bind them to cryptographic keys through the issuance of electronic documentsClick to see full answer. In this manner, what is the purpose of a Certificate Authority?In cryptography, a certificate authority or certification authority (CA) is an entity that issues digital certificates. A CA acts as a trusted third party—trusted both by the subject (owner) of the certificate and by the party relying upon the certificate.Additionally, what is the purpose of a digital certificate? An attachment to an electronic message used for security purposes. The most common use of a digital certificate is to verify that a user sending a message is who he or she claims to be, and to provide the receiver with the means to encode a reply. In this regard, how do certificate authorities work? The requester makes a private key and public key pair and submits an “application” called a certificate signing request (CSR) to a trusted certificate authority. The requester can use the signed certificate for the appropriate security protocol: Why would a certificate be revoked?Digital certificates are revoked for many reasons. If a CA discovers that it has improperly issued a certificate, for example, it may revoke the original certificate and reissue a new one. The most common reason for revocation occurs when a certificate’s private key has been compromised.