Bring your own configuration profile signing certificate

[noahtalerman]

Problem

We’d prefer that Fleet instead expose distinct configuration options (a signing key and certificate) to allow users to bring their own certificate signed by a public authority. Not only would this make the initial manual enrollment profile appear as trusted but it’d also remove the need to add a new root certificate to devices (making much of the remaining feedback irrelevant).

From the customer:

The remainder of feedback is covered by the following issues:

• #19538
• #19537

[latacora-paul]

One point of clarification is I think if you allowed "bring your own signing certificate" then you wouldn't need to install the certificate as a root CA on devices at all for this purpose (which should make #19538 and #19537 unnecessary).

For example, if you supported BYO I can use something like a letsencrypt cert or an apple cert to sign the profiles and then they're already trusted by devices without needing to add a new trust anchor.

Example demonstrating creating a publicly trusted profile using letsencrypt/certbot:

# get a certificate from letsencrypt using certbot and route53 for dns challenge
certbot certonly --dns-route53 --key-type rsa -d example.com

# the output path where certbot stores the key/cert 
certs="/etc/letsencrypt/live/example.com"

# sign a mobileconfig file
openssl smime \
    -sign \
    -signer ${certs}/cert.pem \
    -inkey ${certs}/privkey.pem \
    -certfile ${certs}/chain.pem \
    -nodetach \
    -outform der \
    -in enrollment-profile.mobileconfig \
    -out enrollment-profile-signed.mobileconfig

[noahtalerman]

Thanks @latacora-paul!

The plan it to weigh this request at the next feature feston 2024-06-20.

[dherder]

@noahtalerman this will be important for BYOD iOS workflows

[noahtalerman]

Hey @dherder why do you think this will be important?

[dherder]

@noahtalerman sorry I missed this

do you think this will be important?

For a BYOD user, if a user is prompted to install an untrusted config profile, it is likely that will be a barrier to adoption. End users are trained to not install things that have red text.