Using prior version self-cert Digital Certificates in Office 2007

N

Neil Dittmar

We have a number of "applets" that use Word and Excel (VBA and macros) to
function. These applets were originally designed in Office 2000 and 2003
using the self-certification tool included with those versions to sign them
for use in higher security environments where macro security is enabled.
They currently function in those environments without error or issue.

We are currently setting up our first Vista Workstation (running Ultimate
32-bit) and have discovered that Office 2007 treats our self-certified
applets differently than prior versions. Via the official Office website, we
learned that if macro security is enabled in Office, our self-certified
applets can only run macros if the digital certificate is added to the
Personal certificates folder. When we install our certificate via the
facility through Office 2007, it is placed in the "Intermediate Certification
Authorities" folder, not Personal. Exporting the certificate from the
"Intermediate" folder and importing it into the Personal folder results in a
"certificate imported successfully" message. However, the certificate does
not actually appear in the Personal folder and macros are not enabled on the
applets when executed.

Finally, we've found that creating a digital certificate using the
self-certification tool included with Office 2007 does allow us to import the
resulting cert file into the Personal certificates folder. Is it correct
that we will have to re-open and re-sign all of our self-certified applets
within Office 2007 for macros to be enabled properly? If so, what of our
clients that are using older versions of Office for which the applets were
originally designed? Is there any backwards compatibility between Office
2007 self-cert digital certificates and older versions of Office? Will we
have to maintain two different versions of the applets with two different
self-cert digital certificates?

Any help or information would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Neil Dittmar
Software Developer
Aurora Information Systems
 

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