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EnterpriseAdvanced

Certificate Pinning Explained

Learn how certificate pinning works, why it breaks apps after cert rotation, and modern alternatives like Certificate Transparency.

Interactive Demo

Certificate Pinning

Certificate Pinning

Extra protection beyond standard CA validation for mobile apps

Normal TLS Trust

Browser trusts ANY certificate signed by ~150 CAs

DigiCert signed it? Trusted

Let's Encrypt signed it? Trusted

Random CA? ...Also trusted

Rogue CA fake cert? ...Still trusted!

Pinned TLS Trust

App trusts ONLY this specific certificate/key

Expected DigiCert cert? Trusted

Different DigiCert cert? REJECTED

Let's Encrypt cert? REJECTED

Rogue CA cert? REJECTED

Only the pinned cert works

How Pin Validation Works

Certificate pinning: Trust only what you expect, reject everything else

Want to learn more?

Read our complete guide on certificate pinning

Continue Learning

Failure Scenarios

Certificate Transparency

mTLSPrev View All Demos cert-manager for K8sNext

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