The mission of the Definitions and Glossary Working Group is to: establish a glossary document encapsulating a set of definitions for terms used within the CA/Browser Forum and its Guidelines.
End date: November 1, 2026 Initial Chair / Vice-Chair: Tim Hollebeek / Tim Callan Meeting Schedule:
- Conference Call; time and frequency TBD by consensus discussion in the CWG
- Face-to-face discussions up to 3 times annually
Types of Voting Members Eligible to Participate: Certificate Issuers and Certificate Consumers Voting Structure for WG: See Bylaws and Section 3.2 of this Charter
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group shall establish and specify a list of capitalized terms, with associated definitions, used within the context of work by the Forum. In order to ensure the Definitions and Glossary Working Group may define all terms relevant to the Forum, this Working Group’s scope includes the terminology used within each Chartered Working Group or Subcommittee within the Forum. The Definitions and Glossary Working Group shall not establish Normative Requirements, nor specify how defined terms are or may be used within documentation produced by other Chartered Working Groups. The existence of a certain term, defined by the Definitions and Glossary Working Group, shall not impede or limit the ability for any Chartered Working Group to provide its own definition for the same term.
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group shall produce a Final Guideline representing a glossary of capitalized terms and their definitions used within the CA/Browser Forum. This Final Guideline shall be produced with the intent that it may be incorporated by other Chartered Working Groups, as applicable to the scope of the various Guidelines produced within each Chartered Working Group.
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group shall maintain its published Guideline as needed to incorporate additional defined terms, to modify extant defined terms, or to remove defined terms which are no longer necessary.
- Prepare a Draft Guideline;
- Prepare a ballot to adopt the Draft Guideline as a Final Guideline within the Definitions and Glossary Working Group; and
- Follow established ballot discussion and voting procedures to formally advance the Draft Guideline to a Final Guideline.
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group shall:
- Comply with all applicable laws, rules and regulations;
- Comply with the terms and conditions of the CA/Browser Forum Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) Policy and Bylaws;
- Follow RFC 3647 to the extent applicable within the Definitions and Glossary Working Group’s scope; and
- Follow other technical requirements regarding the preparation of minutes and the use of public mailing lists within the Forum.
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group shall not:
- Address certificate management, use, and validation;
- Address certificate issuance policies and practices;
- Establish Normative Requirements;
- Specify how terms defined by the Definitions and Glossary Working Group are or may be used within documentation produced by other Chartered Working Groups; nor
- Impede or limit the ability for any Chartered Working Group to establish its own definitions for terms used both in the scope of the Definitions and Glossary Working Group and another Chartered Working Group.
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group will deliver the following:
- Draft Guideline for WG review
- Draft of ballot for approval of Draft Guideline as a Final Guideline
- Ballot for approval of Draft Guideline as a Final Guideline
- Final Guideline for WG publication
No other deliverables have been identified for the Definitions and Glossary Working Group at this time.
Milestones may be modified or replaced by consensus of the Working Group, without requiring modification of this Charter. The initial milestones for the Draft Guideline are as follows:
- Identify terms defined in documents published by other Chartered Working Groups within the Forum
- Consolidate all terms along with all differences in their various definitions
- Identify similar terms and consolidate where warranted
- Establish definitions for each identified term, bearing in mind the potential variety of use-cases
- Separate defined terms as needed in order to provide clarity around use within different use-cases
- Finalize defined terms in a Draft Guideline and share within the Forum for discussion and review
This Working Group shall have the following categories of membership: Certificate Consumer, Certificate Issuer, Associate Member, and Interested Party.
Applicants must be members of the CSCWG, the SMCWG, or the SCWG, and may join the Definitions and Glossary Working Group only with such status or class as they hold in such other Chartered Working Groups.
In accordance with the IPR Policy, Members that choose to participate in the Definitions and Glossary Working Group must declare their participation and class of membership prior to participating. The Chair of the Definitions and Glossary Working Group shall establish a mailing list for use by the Working Group, including for declarations of participation, and manage it in accordance with the Bylaws, the IPR Policy, and the IPR Agreement. A Member must declare its participation in the Definitions and Glossary Working Group on the Working Group’s mailing list.
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group shall include Interested Parties and Associate Members as defined in the Bylaws.
The Working Group shall consist of two classes of voting members: Certificate Issuers and Certificate Consumers
In order for a ballot to be adopted by the Definitions and Glossary Working Group, two-thirds or more of the votes cast by the Certificate Issuers must be in favor of the ballot and more than half of the votes cast by the Certificate Consumers must be in favor of the ballot. At least one member of each class must vote in favor of a ballot for it to be adopted. Quorum is defined as more than half of the average number of Voting Member organizations (cumulative) that have participated in the previous three Definitions and Glossary Working Group Meetings or Teleconferences (not counting subcommittee meetings thereof). For transition purposes, if three meetings have not yet occurred, quorum is ten (10).
Members may resign from the Working Group at any time through a message to the Working Group’s mailing list. Resignation does not prevent a Member from potentially having continuing obligations, under the Forum's IPR Policy or any other document.
Votes cast before a Voting Member's resignation is announced will stand.
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group shall coordinate with, and seek guidance from, the following other CA/Browser Forum Chartered Working Groups, as needed or applicable:
- Code Signing Certificate Working Group;
- Network Security Working Group;
- Server Certificate Working Group; and
- S/MIME Certificate Working Group.
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group may coordinate with, or seek guidance from, other CA/Browser Forum Chartered Working Groups or Subcommittees as deemed appropriate by the Working Group.
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group shall coordinate with, and seek guidance from, the following external organizations, as needed or applicable:
- Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF);
- International Organization for Standardization (ISO); and
- World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group may coordinate with, or seek guidance from, other external organizations as deemed appropriate by consensus within the Working Group.
To be successful, the Definitions and Glossary Working Group is expected to have 14 or more active participants for its duration. The Working Group participants are expected to contribute an appropriate number of hours per week towards the Working Group’s activities.
Most Definitions and Glossary Working Group Teleconferences will focus on discussion of particular specifications, and will be conducted on an as-needed basis. The Working Group conducts its work primarily on the Definitions and Glossary Working Group mailing list, which is available to the public. Information about the group will be available via the CA/Browser Forum website (https://cabforum.org).
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group will seek to make decisions when there is consensus and with due process. The expectation is that, typically, the Chair or other participant makes an initial proposal, which is then refined in discussion with the Working Group participants, and consensus emerges with little formal voting being required. However, if a decision is necessary for timely progress, but consensus is not achieved after careful consideration of the range of views presented, the Chair(s) should put the question out for voting within the WG (using email and/or web-based survey techniques) according to Section 2 (Forum Membership and Voting) of the Forum Bylaws and record a decision, along with any objections. The matter should then be considered resolved unless and until new information becomes available.
The Definitions and Glossary Working Group is subject to the CA/Browser Forum Intellectual Rights Policy v.1.3 Effective July 3, 2018 (the “IPR Policy”). To promote the widest adoption of the CA/Browser Forum Guidelines, CA/Browser Forum seeks to issue Final Guidelines and Final Maintenance Guidelines that can be implemented, according to the IPR Policy, on a CA/Browser Forum Royalty-Free License basis. For information about exclusion of Essential Claims, see Section 4 of the IPR Policy.
About this Charter This charter for the Definitions and Glossary Working Group has been created according to Section 5.3.1 of the Bylaws of the CA/Browser Forum. In the event of a conflict between this charter and any provision in either the Bylaws or the IPR Policy, the provision in the Bylaws or IPR Policy shall take precedence.