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Public Key Infrastructure

Set Up Your Digital Identity

To qualify for a University of Wisconsin-Madison digital identity, you must be a current faculty member, staff member or student with an active NetID account and a compelling work-related or academic reason for needing a digital certificate.

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UW-Madison digital identities are valid for one year from the date of issuance and may be renewed before they expire if UW-Madison chooses to continue the PKI program. If the program does move from pilot to production status, users may be asked to share the costs of the service in the future (beyond the one-year no-cost pilot program). If the program does not move from pilot to production status, all digital identities will expire one year from the date of issuance.

DoIT encourages all participants in the PKI pilot program to provide feedback about their use of the PKI system. Send all feedback to pki@doit.wisc.edu.

Follow the steps below to obtain your University of Wisconsin-Madison digital identity:

  1. Visit the DoIT Tech Store (located at 1210 W. Dayton Street) and tell the sales representative that you would like to obtain your UW-Madison digital identity.

  2. You will be asked to present a valid UW-Madison ID card and one secondary form of ID, which cannot be your driver’s license. Acceptable forms of secondary ID include credit cards, bank debit cards, military ID cards, passports, or other organizational identification. The secondary form of ID does not need to contain your photo.

  3. After your identity is verified, you will receive an invitation email at your UW-Madison email address on file.

  4. You will receive an email containing a PIN number and instructions for activating your new digital identity.

Requests for digital certificates are processed twice daily. After completing the initial identity verification process at the DoIT Tech Store, you should receive your automated email enrollment invitation within 1 business day. If you do not receive the PKI invitation email, please contact Nicholas Davis by email, pki@doit.wisc.edu.