Open KEY File

Software which uses KEY Files

Electronic Signature

Besides being Apple Keynote presentations files with KEY extension have other unusual but specific applications. As the same extension indicates, these can be used as product key files (already discussed in another article in this website), as well as for access keys to government portals, operating system registries, etc.

For example, the Mexican Tax Administration Service (SAT, for its acronym in Spanish) uses KEY files as a private key and electronic signature, for its certified users, and this is generated and used by proprietary software called 'Certifica'. This file must be kept by each user / taxpayer and it would be requested every time they have a request from the system.

The usual use that is given to this file is when a user / taxpayer needs to perform digital invoicing, the file allows them to identify themselves and certify that said user is the one authorized to carry out that task.

At the time of writing this article, the structure of this file is unknown and whether it is possible to open it with any other software other than 'Certifica'.

Keyboard definition KEY files

Opening keyboard-related KEY files is only useful in a program that supports custom keyboard shortcuts. If you do not have a program that can use the KEY file, you may be able to read its instructions with a text editor, however, this is rare as KEY files related to a keyboard map are usually , binary. With keyboard definitions, shortcuts, specific functions such as multimedia playback, and others are established, which are provided by .key files. In this case, special care must be taken when trying to manipulate these files as they could disable some (or all) of your keyboard functions.

Antivirus registry key

Some antivirus programs use files with KEY extension, for example Kaspersky which has an activation file that uses this extension. You receive this file by email from Kaspersky Technical Support when you purchase the software license. This file is also binary and cannot (or should not be) edited.