Active Directory: Deploying and managing Certificate Service

Deploying and managing Certificates (ADCS)
⏱️ Length: 2.5 total hours
⭐ 4.24/5 rating
👥 4,836 students
🔄 October 2025 update

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Course Overview
- Welcome to ‘Active Directory: Deploying and Managing Certificate Service’, a focused exploration into one of the most vital yet often underestimated components of enterprise security: Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) through Active Directory Certificate Services (AD CS). This course is meticulously designed to demystify the complexities of digital certificates and their indispensable role in securing modern IT environments. You will embark on a journey that covers the essential principles and practical applications of leveraging AD CS within your existing Active Directory infrastructure to establish a robust and trustworthy foundation for authentication, encryption, and digital signatures.
- In today’s interconnected landscape, protecting sensitive data and verifying identities are paramount. Certificates issued by a well-configured AD CS solution enable secure communications for everything from internal web servers and VPN connections to Wi-Fi access and user authentication. This hands-on, practical course cuts straight to the core, offering you a structured pathway to gain proficiency in setting up, maintaining, and understanding the operational dynamics of your own enterprise Certificate Authority. Whether you’re securing network traffic, enabling smart card logon, or ensuring data integrity, mastering AD CS is a crucial skill for any IT professional tasked with safeguarding organizational assets and identities.
- Despite its concise 2.5-hour duration, this updated October 2025 curriculum is packed with high-impact knowledge, designed to equip you with the confidence to implement secure certificate solutions immediately. It addresses the practical challenges system administrators, network engineers, and security specialists face when integrating PKI into their Windows Server domains. By the end, you’ll not only understand the “how-to” but also the “why” behind critical AD CS configurations, empowering you to build resilient, secure, and compliant certificate infrastructures that underpin a wide array of security services across your enterprise.
Requirements / Prerequisites
- While this course is designed to be accessible, a foundational understanding of Windows Server operating systems is highly recommended. Familiarity with server roles, features, and the basic administration of a Windows Server instance will significantly enhance your learning experience and allow you to grasp concepts more quickly.
- A working knowledge of Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) is beneficial. This includes understanding core Active Directory components such as user accounts, computer objects, security groups, Group Policy Objects (GPOs), and domain controllers, as AD CS deeply integrates with these elements for seamless operation.
- Basic networking fundamentals, including concepts like IP addressing, DNS resolution, and TCP/IP protocols, will be helpful as certificates play a critical role in securing network communications and services. An understanding of how devices communicate on a network will provide a better context for certificate deployment.
- Although not strictly mandatory, having access to a virtualized lab environment (e.g., using Hyper-V, VMware Workstation, or VirtualBox) where you can set up a domain controller and a member server will allow you to practice the deployment and management steps covered in the course. Hands-on application is key to solidifying your understanding.
- No prior specific experience with Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) or Certificate Services is required. The course starts with foundational concepts, building your knowledge progressively. However, a general curiosity about security mechanisms and how digital identities are verified will certainly be an advantage.
Skills Covered / Tools Used
- Designing Robust PKI Hierarchies: Gain insights into architectural best practices for deploying a secure and scalable PKI, including deciding between standalone and enterprise CAs, understanding the role of Root CAs versus Issuing CAs, and planning for redundancy and disaster recovery within your certificate infrastructure.
- Customizing and Managing Certificate Templates: Learn to define and tailor certificate templates to meet specific organizational needs. This includes configuring extensions, validity periods, cryptographic settings, and permissions for various certificate types such as user authentication, computer authentication, web server SSL/TLS, EFS (Encrypting File System), and S/MIME.
- Comprehensive Certificate Lifecycle Management: Master the entire lifecycle of a digital certificate. This encompasses initiating certificate requests, understanding various enrollment methods (manual, auto-enrollment), renewing certificates before expiration, revoking compromised or obsolete certificates, and recovering archived keys securely.
- Implementing Key Archival and Recovery: Understand the critical process of securely archiving private keys for data encryption certificates. You will learn how to configure Key Archival and Recovery agents, ensuring that encrypted data remains accessible even if a user’s private key is lost or corrupted.
- Configuring Certificate Authority Web Enrollment: Discover how to set up and customize the Certificate Authority Web Enrollment pages, providing a user-friendly, browser-based interface for users and administrators to request and renew certificates without direct access to the CA console.
- Integrating Network Device Enrollment Service (NDES): Learn to enable and configure NDES, allowing network devices such as routers, switches, and other non-domain-joined devices to obtain certificates using the Simple Certificate Enrollment Protocol (SCEP), crucial for secure network access and device authentication.
- Deploying Online Responder Service (OCSP): Implement the Online Certificate Status Protocol (OCSP) to provide real-time, lightweight certificate revocation status checks, offering a more efficient alternative to traditional Certificate Revocation Lists (CRLs) for client applications and services.
- Monitoring and Auditing AD CS Operations: Understand how to effectively monitor the health and security of your Certificate Authority using event logs, audit policies, and the Certificate Services console. Learn to identify potential issues and ensure compliance with security standards.
- PowerShell Automation for AD CS: Explore essential PowerShell cmdlets for automating common AD CS administrative tasks, such as managing certificate templates, viewing certificate details, revoking certificates, and extending CA validity, significantly enhancing operational efficiency.
- Key Administrative Tools Utilized: You will gain practical experience with essential AD CS management tools including the Certificate Authority console, Certificate Templates console, Certification Authority Web Enrollment interface, the command-line utility certutil.exe, and various PowerShell cmdlets specifically designed for AD CS.
Benefits / Outcomes
- Upon completing this course, you will possess the practical knowledge and confidence to competently design, deploy, and manage a robust enterprise PKI solution using Active Directory Certificate Services within your organization’s IT infrastructure.
- You will gain the ability to significantly enhance organizational security by effectively issuing and managing digital certificates, thereby securing critical communication channels, authenticating users and devices, and enabling data encryption across various services.
- Develop a deeper understanding of fundamental authentication mechanisms and how digital certificates underpin secure access for web applications (HTTPS/SSL/TLS), VPNs, Wi-Fi networks (802.1X), and client-server communications, leading to a more secure operational environment.
- Acquire hands-on skills immediately applicable in a corporate IT setting, empowering you to implement solutions for secure email (S/MIME), encrypted file systems (EFS), BitLocker Drive Encryption, IPsec, and other certificate-dependent services.
- Be well-prepared to troubleshoot common certificate-related issues and maintain the health of your Certificate Authority, ensuring continuous availability and reliability of certificate services, minimizing downtime and security vulnerabilities.
- Reduce organizational reliance on external, third-party Certificate Authorities for internal services, leading to cost savings and greater control over your certificate issuance policies and lifecycle management.
- Strengthen your professional profile as an IT administrator or security specialist with expertise in a high-demand area of cybersecurity, opening doors to more advanced roles and responsibilities in infrastructure management and security architecture.
PROS
- Highly Relevant Skillset: Addresses a critical and enduring component of enterprise security, making the learned skills immediately valuable and applicable in virtually any Windows-centric IT environment.
- Practical, Hands-On Focus: Emphasizes real-world deployment and operational scenarios, moving beyond theoretical concepts to provide actionable knowledge that can be implemented in a live environment.
- Concise and Efficient Learning: Delivers core, impactful knowledge and skills within a manageable 2.5-hour timeframe, making it ideal for busy professionals seeking to quickly upskill in a specific area.
- Strong Student Endorsement: A high rating of 4.24/5 from over 4,800 students indicates a well-received course with quality content and effective instruction.
- Future-Proofing Your Career: PKI is a foundational security technology that continues to be essential for digital trust and identity verification, ensuring the long-term relevance of the skills you acquire.
- Direct Active Directory Integration: Focuses on leveraging existing Active Directory infrastructure for seamless certificate management, simplifying deployment and administration for organizations already using AD DS.
- Updated Content: The October 2025 update ensures the course material is current with the latest best practices and features in Active Directory Certificate Services.
CONS
- Limited Depth for Niche Scenarios: Given the course’s concise duration, highly advanced, deeply complex, or very specific niche PKI scenarios (e.g., cross-forest trusts, highly customized OCSP configurations, or HSM integration) might only be briefly introduced or not covered in exhaustive detail, potentially requiring further independent study for deep mastery in those areas.