Start out by finding the location for the certificates to be stored: openssl version -d OPENSSLDIR: "/usr/lib/ssl" Directories inside OPENSSLDIR is usually a symbolic link to /etc/ssl, but YMMW. Now upload the CA certificates in PEM format into OPENSSLDIR/certs. Next use this script to create the symbolic links inside the certs directory: #!/bin/sh # # usage: certlink.sh filename [filename ...] for CERTFILE in $*; do # make sure file exists and is a valid cert test -f "$CERTFILE" || continue HASH=$(openssl x509 -noout -hash -in "$CERTFILE") test -n "$HASH" || continue # use lowest available iterator for symlink for ITER in 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9; do test -f "${HASH}.${ITER}" && continue ln -s "$CERTFILE" "${HASH}.${ITER}" test -L "${HASH}.${ITER}" && break done done Now go into OPENSSLDIR/certs and run the script: certlink.sh CA-certificate1.pem CA-certificate2.pem CA-certificate3.pem Now openssl will verify certificates signed by these CA's.