The Hacker News - Cybersecurity News and Analysis: Root Certificate

In a move to protect its users based in Kazakhstan from government surveillance, Google, Apple and Mozilla finally today came forward and blocked Kazakhstan's government-issued root CA certificate within their respective web browsing software. Starting today, Chrome, Safari and Firefox users in Kazakhstan will see an error message stating that the " Qaznet Trust Network " certificate should not be trusted when attempting to access a website that responds with the government-issued certificate. As The Hacker News reported last month , all major Kazakh Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are forcing their customers into installing a government-issued root certificate on their devices in order to regain access to their Internet services. The root certificate in question, labeled as " trusted certificate " or "national security certificate," if installed, allows ISPs to intercept, monitor, and decrypt users' encrypted HTTPS and TLS connections,

If you are in Kazakhstan and unable to access the Internet service without installing a certificate, you're not alone. The Kazakhstan government has once again issued an advisory to all major local Internet Service Providers (ISPs) asking them to make it mandatory for all their customers to install government-issued root certificates on their devices in order to regain access to the Internet services. The root certificate in question, labeled as " trusted certificate " or " national security certificate ," if installed, allows ISPs to intercept and monitor users' encrypted HTTPS and TLS connections, helping the government spy on its citizens and censor content. In other words, the government is essentially launching a "man in the middle" attack on every resident of the country. But how installing a "root certificate" allow ISPs to decrypt HTTPS connection? For those unaware, your device and web browsers automatically trust digi

Next in the queue, Kazakhstan is also planning to Spy on encrypted Internet Traffic of its citizens, but in the most shameless way. Unlike other spying nations that are themselves capable of spying on their citizens, Kazakhstan will force every internet user in the country to install bogus security certs on their PCs and mobile devices, allowing the 'Dictator' Government to: Intercept users' Internet traffic to any Secure website, i.e. Man-in-the-Middle  Attack Access everything from user's web browsing history to usernames and passwords to secure and HTTPS-encrypted traffic This Program will seriously restrict Citizens' Freedom of Speech and Expression. What the F… is "National Internet Security Certificate"? On Monday, the nation's largest Internet service provider Kazakhtelecom JSC published a notice, which said: Citizens are "obliged" to install a so-called " National Internet Security Certificate "