# Policies Obtain policies for establishing trust. ## Discussion For a certificate that is deemed intact and valid (because the chain of signatures is unbroken back to a trusted root certificate), you evaluate it against a set of rules known as a *trust policy*. The policy indicates how particular fields or extensions of a certificate affect whether it should be trusted for a particular use. For example, the policy may state that a certificate must not be expired or must be marked as valid for encryption, code signing, or some other specific purpose. Usually you use a standard, predefined policy, such as the basic X509 policy or the SSL policy. You can also create custom policies with the certificate, key, and trust services API. ## Topics ### Standard Policies [`SecPolicyCreateBasicX509()`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicyCreateBasicX509()) Returns a policy object for the default X.509 policy. [`SecPolicyCreateSSL(_:_:)`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicyCreateSSL(_:_:)) Returns a policy object for evaluating SSL certificate chains. [`SecPolicyCreateRevocation(_:)`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicyCreateRevocation(_:)) Returns a policy object for checking revocation of certificates. [Revocation Policy Constants](/documentation/Security/revocation-policy-constants) Use these flags to create a revocation policy object. [`SecPolicy`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicy) An object that represents a trust policy. [`SecPolicyGetTypeID()`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicyGetTypeID()) Returns the unique identifier of the opaque type to which a policy object belongs. ### Advanced Policy Management [`SecPolicyCreateWithProperties(_:_:)`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicyCreateWithProperties(_:_:)) Returns a policy object based on an object identifier for the policy type. [`SecPolicyCopyProperties(_:)`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicyCopyProperties(_:)) Returns a dictionary containing a policy’s properties. [Security Policy Keys](/documentation/Security/security-policy-keys) Use these dictionary keys to get and set policy properties. [Standard Policies for Specific Certificate Types](/documentation/Security/standard-policies-for-specific-certificate-types) Use special OIDs to cause a certificate to be evaluated based on security policies specific to a given type of certificate. ### Legacy Symbols [`SecPolicySearch`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicySearch) An object that contains information about a policy search. [`SecPolicyCreateWithOID`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicyCreateWithOID) Returns a policy object for the specified policy type object identifier. [`SecPolicyGetOID`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicyGetOID) Retrieves a policy’s object identifier. [`SecPolicyGetTPHandle`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicyGetTPHandle) Retrieves the trust policy handle for a policy object. [`SecPolicyGetValue`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicyGetValue) Retrieves a policy’s value. [`SecPolicySearchCopyNext`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicySearchCopyNext) Retrieves a policy object for the next policy matching specified search criteria. [`SecPolicySearchCreate`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicySearchCreate) Creates a search object for finding policies. [`SecPolicySetProperties`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicySetProperties) Sets properties for a policy. [`SecPolicySetValue`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicySetValue) Sets a policy’s value. [`SecPolicySearchGetTypeID`](/documentation/Security/SecPolicySearchGetTypeID) Returns the unique identifier of the opaque type to which a `SecPolicySearch` object belongs. --- Copyright © 2026 Apple Inc. All rights reserved. | [Terms of Use](https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/terms/site.html) | [Privacy Policy](https://www.apple.com/privacy/privacy-policy)