Press releases

The first certificate authority for emobility certificates goes into operation - Simple use of plug & charge possible at any charging station

[Berlin, Essen, March 31st, 2014] Working on behalf of Hubject GmbH, a Berlin-based joint venture between the automotive, IT and energy industries, the IT security company secunet has developed the world’s first operational emobility certificate authority for master certificates. Such certificates will be required in future to ensure that electric vehicles can safely communicate with the corresponding charging infrastructure. They also lay the groundwork for use of the plug & charge system, which allows automatic, cash-free settlement at any publicly accessible charging station.

Individual electronic certificates enable the respective customers and charging stations to identify each other in an unambiguous and reliable manner in the course of the communications process taking place during the charging process. The certification authority (Root CA) being placed into service by Hubject generates master certificates for automobile manufacturers, charging infrastructure operators, and EV electricity suppliers, who can then use these master certificates to create derived certificates for use in their own products.

The international ISO standard no. 15118, which governs the proper charging of electric vehicles at the "wall boxes", the personal charging stations, stipulates a "Root Certificate Authority" as a prerequisite - i.e. precisely the type of certificate authority that Hubject is now operating and making available to its European partner companies via the Hubject Platform.