Certificates Management

The Certificates Management module for Sysdig Secure provides a simple interface for administrators to create, upload, update, or delete the certificates that are used for content exported from the Sysdig environment.

Specifically, it:

  • Optimizes the secure handling of certificates
  • Supports .csr flows
  • Provides a UI for certificate management
  • Adds support for client-side certificates in the events forwarder

At this time, the feature is for Sysdig Secure SaaS only, and is integrated with the appropriate event forwarding options:

(Note: Kafka authentication is handled through a different mechanism.)

Access the Certificates Management Page

  1. Log in to Sysdig Secure as admin and navigate to Settings from your user profile.

  2. Select Certificates Management.

Create a Certificate

Certificate creation requires several steps, defined below.

Thereafter, you can assign the certificate to the event forwarding integrations.

Generate a CA-Signed Key and Cert

You must have a signed key and certificate from a Certificate Authority (CA), a step that your organization may already have done. If not, follow these steps:

  1. Generate the CA key:

    openssl genrsa -out ca.key 4096

  2. Generate the CA certificate, setting the expiration to 10 years from now:

    openssl req -x509 -new -nodes -key ca.key -sha256 -days 1825 -out ca.pem

You will be prompted to provide details to populate the certificate information. Be as thorough as possible. Save the resulting ca.pem file.

Obtain the Certificate Signing Request (CSR)

The Certificates Management UI streamlines the process of obtaining a certificate-signing request (CSR).

  1. Log in to Sysdig Secure as admin and select Settings > Certificates Management.

  2. Select New CSR and copy the text using the Copy and Next button.

    You will be prompted to leave the Sysdig UI to finish generating the certificate in an external tool.

Generate the .crt Certificate File Externally

Use a 3rd-party tool, such as OpenSSL or Digicert, to generate the .crt file. Follow the instructions given with that tool, using the CSR you generated. Below an example with openssl:

openssl x509 -req -in signing-request.csr -CA ca.pem -CAkey ca.key -CAcreateserial -out signed-cert.pem
  • signing-request.csr is the filename given to Certificate Signing Request (CSR) retrieved from step above
  • ca.pem is the filename of Certificate Authority (CA) certificate
  • ca.key is Certificate Authority (CA) private key
  • signed-cert.pem is the signed certificate that is gonna be uploaded on Sysdig UI (see step below)

Upload the .crt in the Sysdig UI

  1. Return to the Certificates Management page in the Sysdig Secure Settings and either click Next in the popup window or select Upload Certificate.

  2. Assign the certificate a meaningful name.

  3. Click Upload and Create.

    The certificate will appear in the certificates list and can be applied as needed.

Apply Certificate to Event Forwarding

  1. Log in to Sysdig Secure as admin and select Settings > Event Forwarding.

  2. Choose an existing or new integration for Splunk, Syslog, or Webhook.

  3. Select the correct uploaded certificate from the Certificate field and Save.

Manage Certificates

Check Where Certs Are Used

Each certificate shows in how many places it is used. Click that number to go to each integration using that certificate.

Remove a Certificate

To remove a certificate, first make it unused. Open each integration using the certificate and either remove it from the integration or remove the whole integration itself.

When the certificate is unused, you can remove it.

Update a Certificate

To update a certificate, add a completely new certificate and update the integrations to use it instead of the old one. Then you can remove the old one.