Google has announced it will cease trusting digital certificates issued by Chunghwa Telecom and Netlock due to “patterns of concerning behavior” observed over the past year. This change will take effect with Chrome 139, scheduled for release in early August 2025.

## Key Details of the Change

– Only affects TLS server authentication certificates issued after July 31, 2025
– Certificates issued before this deadline will continue to function normally
– Chunghwa Telecom is Taiwan’s largest telecom provider
– Netlock is a Hungarian digital identity and authentication solutions company

Google cited “compliance failures, unmet improvement commitments, and absence of tangible progress” in response to incident reports as reasons for the decision. When these factors were evaluated against the security risks posed by publicly-trusted Certificate Authorities, Google determined continued trust was no longer justified.

## Impact on Users and Website Operators

Chrome users across all platforms (Windows, macOS, ChromeOS, Android, and Linux) will receive full-screen security warnings when visiting sites using certificates from these CAs issued after the deadline.

Website operators currently using these CAs should:
– Use Chrome Certificate Viewer to check their certificates
– Transition to a different publicly-trusted CA as soon as possible
– Enterprises can override these restrictions by installing the root CA certificate locally

This move follows similar actions by major browsers, including Apple’s decision to distrust NetLock Arany certificates effective November 15, 2024, and the industry-wide distrust of Entrust certificates announced for November 2024.

Earlier this year, Google also reported that the CA/Browser Forum adopted Multi-Perspective Issuance Corroboration and Linting as required practices to strengthen domain validation and identify insecure certificate practices.