Security

This chapter describes Certificate Management and IPSec Management and provides procedures for managing system security.

Set Internet Explorer Security Settings

To download certificates from the server, ensure your Internet Explorer security settings are configured as follows:

Procedure

Step 1

Start Internet Explorer.

Step 2

Navigate to Tools > Internet Option.

Step 3

Click the Advanced tab.

Step 4

Scroll down to the Security section on the Advanced tab.

Step 5

If necessary, clear the Do not save encrypted pages to disk check box.

Step 6

Click OK.

Certificate Management Menu


Note
To access the Security menu items, you must log in to Cisco Unified Communications Operating System Administration using your administrator credentials.

Display Certificates

To display existing certificates, follow this procedure:

Procedure

Step 1

Navigate to Security > Certificate Management.

The Certificate List window appears.

Step 2

You can use the Find controls to filter the certificate list.

Step 3

To view details of a certificate or trust certificate, click its file name.

The Certificate Details window shows information about the certificate.

Step 4

To return to the Certificate List window, click Close to close the Certificate Details window.

Download Certificate

To download a certificate from the Cisco Unified Communications Operating System to your PC, follow this procedure:

Procedure

Step 1

Navigate to Security > Certificate Management.

The Certificate List window appears.
Step 2

You can use the Find controls to filter the certificate list.

Step 3

Click the file name of the certificate.

The Certificate Details window appears.
Step 4

Click Download.PEM File or Download.DER File.

Step 5

In the dialog box, click Save File to download the certificate.

Delete Certificate

To delete a trusted certificate, follow this procedure:


Caution
Deleting a certificate can affect your system operations.

Caution
Any existing CSR for the certificate that you choose from the Certificate list is deleted from the system. You must generate a new CSR.

Procedure

Step 1

Navigate to Security > Certificate Management.

The Certificate List window appears.

Step 2

You can use the Find controls to filter the certificate list.

Step 3

Click the filename of the certificate.

The Certificate Details window appears.
Step 4

Click Delete.

Note 
You must restart the Unified CCX server. In the case of high availability deployments, restart both the nodes.

Regenerate Certificate

To regenerate a certificate, follow this procedure:


Caution

Regenerating a certificate can affect your system operations.

For certificate regeneration, the supported key lengths are restricted to 1024 and 2048.

Procedure

Step 1

Navigate to Security > Certificate Management.

The Certificate List window appears.
Step 2

Click Generate Self-signed.

The Generate New Self-signed Certificate dialog box opens.
Step 3

Choose a certificate name from the Certificate Purpose list.

The following table contains descriptions of the certificate names that appear:

Name

Description

tomcat

This self-signed root certificate is generated during installation for the HTTPS server.

ipsec

This self-signed root certificate is generated during installation for IPSec connections with MGCP and H.323 gateways.

Step 4

Click Generate.

Step 5

After you regenerate a certificate, you must restart the Unified CCX server. In the case of high availability deployments, restart both the nodes.

What to do next

After you regenerate a certificate in Cisco Unified Communications Operating System, you must perform a backup so that the latest backup contains the regenerated certificates.

For information on performing a backup, see the Cisco Unified Contact Center Express System Administration Guide.

Upload Certificate to Server


Caution

Uploading a new certificate can affect your system operations. After you upload a new certificate, you must restart the Unified CCX server (in the case of high availability deployments, restart both nodes).


Note

The system does not distribute trust certificates to other cluster node automatically. If you must have the same certificate on more than one node, you must upload the certificate to each node individually.

Upload Certificate or Certificate Chain

Procedure
Step 1

Navigate to Security > Certificate Management.

The Certificate List window appears.
Step 2

Click Upload Certificate or Certificate Chain.

The Upload Certificate or Certificate Chain dialog box opens.
Step 3

Select the certificate name from the Certificate Purpose list.

Step 4

Select the file to upload by performing one of the following steps:

  • In the File Upload text box, enter the path to the file, or
  • Click the Browse button and navigate to the file; then, click Open.

    Cisco Unified CCX supports Privacy Enhanced Mail (PEM) Base64 encoded format of X.509 certificate (only one PEM certificate in a file), Distinguished Encoding Rules (DER) format of X509 Certificate and DER format of PKCS#7 (Public-Key Cryptography Standards) Certificate Chain. The system does not support PEM format of PKCS#7 Certificate Chain.

Step 5

Click the Upload button to upload the file to the server.

Note 
After you upload a certificate, you must restart the Unified CCX server. In the case of high availability deployments, restart both the nodes.

Directory Trust Certificate


Note

Uploading a Directory Trust Certificate is not applicable for Unified CCX.

Obtain Third-Party CA Certificates

Cisco Unified Communications Operating System supports certificates that a third-party Certificate Authority (CA) issues with PKCS # 10 Certificate Signing Request (CSR). The following table provides an overview of this process, with references to more documentation:

Procedure

Step 1

Generate a CSR on the server.

See Generate Certificate Signing Request.

Step 2

Download the CSR to your PC.

See Download Certificate Signing Request.

Step 3

Use the CSR to obtain an application certificate from a CA.

Get information about obtaining application certificates from your CA. See Application Certificates for more notes.

Step 4

Obtain the CA root certificate.

Get information about obtaining a root certificate from your CA. See Application Certificates for more notes.

Step 5

Upload the CA root certificate to the server.

See Upload Certificate or Certificate Chain.

Step 6

Upload the application certificate to the server.

See Application Certificates
Step 7

Restart the Unified CCX server. In the case of high availability deployments, restart both the nodes.

Generate Certificate Signing Request

To generate a Certificate Signing Request (CSR), follow these steps:

For CSR generation, the supported key lengths are restricted to 1024 and 2048.

Procedure
Step 1

Navigate to Security > Certificate Management.

The Certificate List window appears.
Step 2

Click Generate CSR.

The Generate Certificate Signing Certificate dialog box opens.
Step 3

Select the certificate name from the Certificate Purpose list.

Note 

For the current release of the Cisco Unified Operating System, the Directory option no longer appears in the list of Certificate Names.

Step 4

Click Generate.

Download Certificate Signing Request

To download a Certificate Signing Request, follow this procedure:

Procedure
Step 1

Navigate to Security > Certificate Management.

The Certificate List window appears.
Step 2

Click Download CSR.

The Download Certificate Signing Request dialog box opens.
Step 3

Select the certificate name from the Certificate Name list.

Step 4

Click Download CSR.

Step 5

In the File Download dialog box, click Save.

Application Certificates

To use an application certificate that a third-party CA issues, you must obtain both the signed application certificate and the CA root certificate from the CA. Collect information about obtaining these certificates from your CA. The process varies among CAs.


Note
Ensure that you get an RSA signed certificate from CA.

Cisco Unified Communications Operating System generates certificates in DER and PEM encoding formats and generates CSRs in PEM encoding format. It accepts certificates in DER and PEM encoding formats.

For all certificate types, obtain and upload a CA root certificate and an application certificate on each node. Or upload Certificate Chain that has both the application certificate and the chain of the corresponding certificate issuer.

The CSRs for Tomcat and IPSec use the following extensions: 

X509v3 Key Usage: 
Digital Signature, Key Encipherment, Data Encipherment, Key Agreement
X509v3 Extended Key Usage:
TLS Web Server Authentication, TLS Web Client Authentication, IPSec End System

  1. Upload the CA root certificate of the CA that signed an application certificate. If a subordinate CA signs an application certificate, you must upload the CA root certificate of the subordinate CA, not the root CA.

  2. Upload CA root certificates and application certificates by using the same Upload Certificate dialog box. When you upload a CA root certificate, choose the certificate name with the format certificate type-trust.

  3. When you upload an application certificate, choose the certificate name that only includes the certificate type. For example, choose tomcat-trust when you upload a Tomcat CA root certificate; choose tomcat when you upload a Tomcat application certificate. Restart the Unified CCX server.

Monitor Certificate Expiration Dates

The system can automatically send you an e-mail when a certificate is close to its expiration date. To view and configure the Certificate Expiration Monitor, follow this procedure:

Procedure

Step 1

Navigate to Security > Certificate Monitor.

The Certificate Monitor window appears.

Step 2

Enter the required configuration information.

See the table below for a description of the Certificate Monitor Expiration fields.

Step 3

To save your changes, click Save.

Table 1. Certificate Monitor Field Descriptions
Field Description

Notification Start Time

Enter the number of days before the certificate expires that you want to be notified.

Notification Frequency

Enter the frequency for notification, either in hours or days.

Enable Email Notification

Select the check box to enable e-mail notification.

Email IDs

Enter the e-mail address to which you want notifications sent.

Note 

For the system to send notifications, you must configure an SMTP host.

IPSec Management

The following topics describe the functions that you can perform with the IPSec menu:


Note

IPSec does not automatically get set up between nodes in the cluster during installation.

Set Up New IPSec Policy

Any changes that you make to an IPSec policy during a system upgrade are lost, so do not modify or create IPSec policies during an upgrade.


Caution

IPSec, especially with encryption, affects the performance of your system.

Procedure

Step 1

Navigate to Security > IPSEC Configuration.

The IPSEC Policy List window appears.
Step 2

Click Add New.

The IPSEC Policy Configuration window appears.
Step 3

Enter the appropriate information on the IPSEC Policy Configuration window. See the table below for descriptions of the fields on this window.

Step 4

Click Save to set up the new IPSec policy.

Table 2. IPSec Policy and Association Field Descriptions
Field Description
Policy Group Name

Specifies the name of the IPSec policy group. The name can contain only letters, digits, and hyphens.

Policy Name

Specifies the name of the IPSec policy. The name can contain only letters, digits, and hyphens.

Authentication Method

Specifies the authentication method.

Preshared Key

Specifies the preshared key if you selected Pre-shared Key in the Authentication Name field.

Note 

Pre-shared IPSec keys can contain alphanumeric characters and hyphens only, not white spaces or any other characters. If you are migrating from a Windows-based version of Unified CCX, you may need to change the name of your pre-shared IPSec keys, so they are compatible with current versions of Unified CCX.

Peer Type

Specifies whether the peer is the same type or different.

Certificate Name

If you choose Different for the Peer Type, enter the new certificate name.

Destination Address

Specifies the IP address or FQDN of the destination.

Destination Port

Specifies the port number at the destination.

Source Address

Specifies the IP address or FQDN of the source.

Source Port

Specifies the port number at the source.

Mode

Specifies Transport mode.

Remote Port

Specifies the port number to use at the destination.

Protocol
Specifies the protocol:

  • TCP

  • UDP

  • Any

Encryption Algorithm
From the drop-down list, choose the encryption algorithm. Choices include

  • DES

  • 3DES

Hash Algorithm
Specifies the hash algorithm:

  • SHA1—Hash algorithm that is used in phase 1 IKE negotiation

  • MD5—Hash algorithm that is used in phase 1 IKE negotiation

ESP Algorithm
From the drop-down list, choose the ESP algorithm. Choices include

  • NULL_ENC

  • DES

  • 3DES

  • BLOWFISH

  • RIJNDAEL

Phase One Life Time

Specifies the lifetime for phase One, IKE negotiation, in seconds.

Phase One DH

From the drop-down list, choose the phase One DH value. Choices include: 2, 1, and 5.

Phase Two Life Time

Specifies the lifetime for phase Two, IKE negotiation, in seconds.

Phase Two DH

From the drop-down list, choose the phase Two DH value. Choices include: 2, 1, and 5.

Enable Policy

Check the check box to enable the policy.

Manage IPSec Policies

To display, enable or disable, or delete an existing IPSec policy, follow this procedure:


Note

Because any changes that you make to an IPSec policy during a system upgrade are lost, do not modify or create IPSec policies during an upgrade.


Caution

IPSec, especially with encryption, will affect the performance of your system.


Caution

Any changes that you make to the existing IPSec policies can impact your normal system operations.

Procedure

Step 1

Navigate to Security > IPSEC Configuration.

Note 

To access the Security menu items, you must log in to Cisco Unified Communications Operating System Administration again by using your Administrator password.

The IPSEC Policy List window appears.
Step 2

To display, enable, or disable a policy, follow these steps:

  1. Click the policy name.

    The IPSEC Policy Configuration window appears.

  2. To enable or disable the policy, click the Enable Policy check box.

  3. Click Save.

Step 3

To delete one or more policies, follow these steps:

  1. Check the check box next to the policies that you want to delete.

    You can click Select All to select all policies or Clear All to clear all the check boxes.

  2. Click Delete Selected.

Bulk Certificate Management

To support the Extension Mobility Cross Cluster (EMCC) feature, the system allows you to execute a bulk import and export operation to and from a common SFTP server that has been configured by the cluster administrator.

To use Bulk Certificate Management to export certificates, use the following procedure:

  1. Navigate to Security > Bulk Certificate Management.

    The Bulk Certificate Management window displays.

  2. Enter the appropriate information on the Bulk Certificate Management window.

  3. To save the values you entered, click Save.

  4. To export certificates, click Export.

    The Bulk Certificate Export popup window displays.

  5. From the drop-down menu, choose Tomcat as the type of certificate to export.

  6. Click Export.

    The system exports and stores the certificates you chose on the central SFTP server.

You can also use the Bulk Certificate Management window to import certificates that you have exported from other clusters. However, before the Import button displays, you must complete the following activities:

  • Export the certificates from at least two clusters to the SFTP server.

  • Consolidate the exported certificates.