Other aspects

Digital signature

The AS2 protocol requires the use of a signature applied at the transport level, via S/MIME and X.509 certificates. Authentication results from the comparison between the issuer's and recipient's public and private keys.

Document-level signatures are mandatory for communications via web services, but optional for AS2 communications, since this channel already provides a signature at the S/MIME level. Source: Electronic Document Transmission Guide FE-AP, ESPAP-IP

ilink always validates the signature of all received documents. You can use this validator to verify the signature. The following formats are accepted: PADES (PDF), XMLDSig and XADES-BES enveloped (XML). ilink expects the public key used in the signature to be included in the XMLDSig; pre-configuration of keys is not required.

Connection requests

Connection requests must be submitted to the ilink team via the connection portal whenever a customer of an external broker wishes to connect to an ilink customer (and vice versa). This process is carried out for each pair of customers.

When the ilink team receives a connection request from another broker, the response will include any additional validations required by the customer for received files (e.g., attached PDF, commitment number, etc.), if applicable.

Certificate changes

Certificates used by ilink for AS2 communications normally have a validity of 3 years. Any certificate changes are communicated to partners 1 month in advance.