Error when trying to obtain a certificate: The specified item could not be found in the keychain

Question

I was having a problem with codesigning my apps, so I deleted all the keys from the keychain. Then I went to Certificate Assistant => Request a certificate from a Certif

Answer 1

This was happening to me I noticed that the menu option for creating the certificate request had changed from

Request a Certificate from a Certificate Authority...

to

Request a Certificate from a Certificate Authority with "My Name"...

I'm on a domain at work so I logged out, logged in and out as another user, then logged in again. After that the menu appeared as expected and this error went away

Answer 2

You are (perhaps accidentally) asking Keychain Access to generate a Certificate Signing Request using an existing key. If a key is selected when you go into the Keychain Access - Certificate Assistant menu, the options presented will be for that selected key.

Choose a non-key item in your keychain (like a saved password) and go to Keychain Access - Certificate Assistant again to generate the CSR normally.

Answer 3

For me the problem are one certificate that was messed up.

There was no need for me to delete all my certs.

Identifying the bad certificate:

1. From you Keychains select Login From Category select Certificates
2. Find any Apple Certificate that has the blue +
3. Double click on the certificate.
4. Expand the Trust If it's messed up then the "When using this certificate" is set to "Always Trust" along with the blue +

Fixing the bad certificate:

1. Just set it to "Use System Defaults" and close it.
2. You'll get a pop up. Type in your password to update settings.
3. Close KeyChain.
4. Go back to your project, clean and run.
5. Problem should have gone away. If that didn't work then go back to Keychain and just double check and see if there are any other Apple certificates that are set to Always Trust and repeat the process.