SQL Server Certificate file

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SQL Server Certificate file

m--S3qU3L

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July 7, 2010 at 4:27 am

#147916

Hi all,
While migrating the database files (both .mdf & .ldf files) from old server to the new server, Is it necessary to move the certificate files to new server?
Also please advise whats the significance of this certificate files (.cer files found at DATA FOLDER)
Thanks in advance
John

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David Baffaleuf SSCrazy Points: 2159 More actions · Answer 1

SQL Server creates a self signed certificate when starting to be able to respond to encrypted connection attemps. You can see it in the ERRORLOG file:

"2008-12-11 12:12:09.68 Server A self-generated certificate was successfully loaded for encryption."

You'll generally want to use external certificates. If you don't use SQL Server certificate in your connections, you don't need to move it.

David B.

m--S3qU3L Hall of Fame Points: 3706 More actions · Answer 2

Whats an external certificate. Is it something that we create?

As in the below link:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms187798(SQL.90).aspx

Thanks for responding

John

David Baffaleuf SSCrazy Points: 2159 More actions · Answer 3

By external I mean a certificate issued by a trusted third party company like Verisign/Thawte...

The certificates you can create through T-SQL are not used to encrypt the communication channels between clients and servers, rather to encrypt the data itself or sign code modules within SQL Server.

- certificates for client/server purposes: http://support.microsoft.com/?scid=kb%3Ben-us%3B316898&x=7&y=9

- Module signing: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms345102.aspx

- Data encryption: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb510663.aspx

HTH

David B.