A method for creating device certificates for electronic devices (101-103), comprising the steps of: - providing an electronic device (101-103) that has a secret stored therein which is not readable from outside the device, - creating a device certificate whose certificate information is cryptographically bound to the secret, wherein said device certificate comprises a digital signature generated using a signing key and is authenticatable by means of a certificate chain , the certificate chain being a sequence of at least two certificates starting with the device certificate , wherein each certificate of the certificate chain comprises an information defining the validity period of the respective certificate, and wherein each certificate of the certificate chain with the exception of the device certificate comprises a certificate information by means of which the respective previous certificate in the sequence is authenticatable, and - creating a confirmation information which confirms that the device certificate was created by an authorized entity, wherein the confirmation information comprises that the device certificate or an information derived from the device certificate is stored in retrievable manner in a predefined database, and providing, in response to the confirmation information, a digitally signed piece of status information for the device certificate , which comprises a proof that the device certificate was created by an authorized entity, and/or - generating a digitally signed timestamp which associates the device certificate with the time at which the timestamp is created, wherein the digitally signed timestamp is generated, in response to a request for generating a timestamp, by a server which provides a timestamp service, the generated timestamps are counted, and the server only generates the timestamp as long as a predefined upper limit of the number of generated timestamps is not exceeded. - providing an electronic device (101-103) that has a secret stored therein which is not readable from outside the device, - creating a device certificate whose certificate information is cryptographically bound to the secret, wherein said device certificate comprises a digital signature generated using a signing key and is authenticatable by means of a certificate chain , the certificate chain being a sequence of at least two certificates starting with the device certificate , wherein each certificate of the certificate chain comprises an information defining the validity period of the respective certificate, and wherein each certificate of the certificate chain with the exception of the device certificate comprises a certificate information by means of which the respective previous certificate in the sequence is authenticatable, and - creating a confirmation information which confirms that the device certificate was created by an authorized entity, wherein the confirmation information comprises that the device certificate or an information derived from the device certificate is stored in retrievable manner in a predefined database, and providing, in response to the confirmation information, a digitally signed piece of status information for the device certificate , which comprises a proof that the device certificate was created by an authorized entity, and/or - generating a digitally signed timestamp which associates the device certificate with the time at which the timestamp is created, wherein the digitally signed timestamp is generated, in response to a request for generating a timestamp, by a server which provides a timestamp service, the generated timestamps are counted, and the server only generates the timestamp as long as a predefined upper limit of the number of generated timestamps is not exceeded. <EOS>