Using the Certificates snap-in in Microsoft Windows 2000 and later, you can do many tasks regarding certificates and certificate management. One of these tasks is exporting server certificates for use in an Internet Information Services (IIS) versions 5.0 and later Web server. In order for a server certificate to be used by the web server, you must export the private key along with the certificate. Without the private key, data encryption (and therefore secure communications) is not possible.
When exporting the server certificate from the server's personal certificate store, you may not have the option to export the private key. If this is the case, when the certificate was imported, the option to allow the private key to be exported may have been unchecked. This is a security measure to prevent a possible compromise of the server's private key. Since this could be a potential security risk, the option to mark the private key as exportable is not checked by default.
When exporting the server certificate from the server's personal certificate store, you may not have the option to export the private key. If this is the case, when the certificate was imported, the option to allow the private key to be exported may have been unchecked. This is a security measure to prevent a possible compromise of the server's private key. Since this could be a potential security risk, the option to mark the private key as exportable is not checked by default.