No Luck Using a SSL Certificate with WebAdmin/User Portal

Well I had a large posting with details but the forum filters decided it was spam.  So here's the short version.

After uploading the p12 bundle it looks like the files are stored here:

/var/sec/chroot-httpd/etc/httpd/WebAdminCert.pem
/var/sec/chroot-httpd/etc/httpd/WebAdminKey.pem
/var/sec/chroot-httpd/etc/httpd/WebAdminCertCA.pem

The top file only contains the site cert, no 3rd party CA info.  The file looks like output from this command:

openssl x509 -in certificate.crt -text -noout

The second one is the private key for the site cert.

The third file is a locally generated cert which contains info found in Management, System settings.

There's also a configuration file that references the files above.

SSLCertificateFile /etc/httpd/WebAdminCert.pem
SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/httpd/WebAdminKey.pem

So if it's using WebAdminCert.pem it's never going to work because the 3rd party CA info is not in the file.

Pretty much what this post says:

https://community.sophos.com/products/unified-threat-management/f/general-discussion/22147/no-luck-using-a-ssl-certificate-with-webadmin-user-portal/59133#59133

I offer this as a solution.  Here's everything from the beginning.

Create CSR and private key in OpenSSL.

openssl req -out site.csr -new -newkey rsa:2048 -nodes -keyout private.key

Get your site certificate and CA certs from the CA.

Create PKCS12 in OpenSSL:

openssl pkcs12 -export -out site.p12 -inkey private.key -in sitecert.crt -certfile cachain.crt

sitecert.crt Your site certificate that came from the CA.

cachain.crt: I used the intermediate + root CA since the CA sent them together in a bundle. You may only need the intermediate CA but doesn't hurt to have both.  (Or more if needed)

UTM > Remote Access, Cert Mgmt

New Certificate

Give it a name, upload, PKCS#12, browse to file, provide password for file, save.

You should see your site cert in Certificates and the CA certs in the Certificate Authority tab.

Activate your new cert in Management, WebAdmin settings, HTTPs Certificate.

Test it: https://www.digicert.com/help/

The trust chain is most likely broken.

If so, combine the site cert, intermediate CA, and Root CA into a single file named WebAdminCert-fixed.pem.

-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
<domain_name crt>
-----END CERTIFICATE-----
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
(Intermediate CA crt)
-----END CERTIFICATE-----
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
(Root CA crt)
-----END CERTIFICATE-----

Turn on shell access in the UTM.

Upload the file to the UTM using WinSCP or another client.  I chose to upload it to /tmp.

Use putty or another client to SSH into the UTM as loginuser.

su root

cd /var/sec/chroot-httpd/etc/httpd

cp WebAdminCert.pem WebAdminCert.pem.bak

cp /tmp/WebAdminCert-fixed.pem WebAdminCert.pem

/etc/init.d/httpd restart

Test at: https://www.digicert.com/help/

Also make sure you can still login to the UTM Admin page before exiting the shell.

exit

exit

Turn off shell access.

Done!

This works great, however it seems that certificates are reset when the machine/VM is restarted. Might be a pain for those who restart occasionally.

Darn.  You are right.  I hadn't done a restart.  Must be getting copied back over from somewhere.

Robert

Robert Yount said:

Darn.  You are right.  I hadn't done a restart.  Must be getting copied back over from somewhere.

Robert

What is the resolution for this? Am running Sophos UTM 9.4.

Hi,

"After installation, only some browsers (Safari & Chrome on OS X) show it as trusted. Others (Firefox on OS X, Safari on iOS, Chrome on Android, etc.) show it as untrusted."

If the configuration works on a set of browser and doesn't work on the other set then, it should be a problem more inclined towards the non-working set of browsers.

Alongside, there is known that the full certificate chain is not provided via UTM which effects functionalities like a PCI scan: reported under NUTM-4380.

Can you try to add the certificates from a different route and verify if that works, Web Protection>Filtering Options>Misc>Certificate for End-User Pages. 

Restart httpproxy, /var/mdw/scripts/httpproxy restart

Any help with that? If the issue is not resolved through this I suggest you should contact Support.

Thanks

Okay, so after playing with this for far longer than we should have to, we've come up with a solution that will survive reboots :)

First of all, we need to generate the correct certificate file including the entire chain of intermediate certificates except for the root certificate. The structure will be similar to this:

... there might be some metadata in here, or not ...
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
end-entity certificate, the one given to you by your CA
-----END CERTIFICATE-----
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----  --|
-----END CERTIFICATE-----      |   certificate chain between your end-entity
...                            |-- cert and the root certificate, 
-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----    |   excluding both
-----END CERTIFICATE-----    --|

To make this simpler and more consistent, i’ll work through an example with a certificate for webmail.example.com. Substitute this for your own domain wherever applicable.

Getting the correct intermediate chain

You can get the correct chain from checking your site on https://whatsmychaincert.com: Under “Test Your Server”, enter your UTM’s public hostname and press Test. Most likely, you’ll get an error:

Click the This link to download the correct certificate chain (the website explains how this works, if you’re curious). I’ll save it as webmail.example.com.chain.crt.

Now, concatenate your end-entity certificate with the certificate chain. If you don’t know where to find your end-entity certificate, you can get it off your UTM appliance like so:
$ scp loginuser@<utm>:/var/confd/certs/host.cert host.crt

To create the correct certificate chain:

$ cat host.crt webmail.example.com.chain.crt > webmail.example.com.crt

Prepare certificate

This step will make sense a little bit later. Basically we need to replace all 0a characters (line feed) in the webmail.example.com.crt file with the \n string:

$ sed ':a;N;$!ba;s/\n/\\n/g' webmail.example.com.crt 
    > webmail.example.com-prepared.crt

Paste certificate into UTM’s confd storage

Next, ssh into your UTM box:

$ ssh loginuser@utm
$ sudo su - root
# cc

Now you’re in the Confd-Client of the UTM appliance. To modify the certificate, we need to figure out its REF-id in the system. The easiest way I know of is to find a reference to it somewhere in the object tree. In my case, it was used under webadmin/cert$:

127.0.0.1 MAIN > webadmin
127.0.0.1 MAIN webadmin > cert$
webmail.example.com                   [REF_CaHosWebmailexa]

That REF_ string is the key to the certificate we want to modify. Yours will most likely be different. Now, re-enter the confd-client:

127.0.0.1 MAIN webadmin/cert (REF:ca->host_key_cert) > exit
# cc

Open the certificate object behind that REF_ key. For that we need to enter OBJS mode (replace REF_CaHosWebmailexa with the REF key):

127.0.0.1 MAIN > OBJS
127.0.0.1 OBJS > ca
127.0.0.1 OBJS ca > REF_CaHosWebmailexa

Now for the tricky part. Enter certificate="", but dont press [Enter] yet.

127.0.0.1 OBJS ca [REF_CaHosWebmailexa] > certificate=""

Move the cursor in between the two quotes. Now, from the webmail.example.com-prepared.crt file we created earlier, copy the first line without the newline character at the end (i.e. everything from the beginning until, and including, the last dash of END CERTIFICATE-----). Paste it into the terminal. The input line should look like this now (dont press [Enter] yet):

<.........\n-----END CERTIFICATE-----"

Add a \n to the end:

<.........\n-----END CERTIFICATE-----\n"

Now press [Enter]. Check the certificate property of the object again: It should look exactly like the original webmail.example.com.crt certificate file opened in a text editor (except for the very first line). If it looks good, commit the change by entering w: (or abort with Ctrl+C if not)

127.0.0.1 OBJS ca [REF_CaHosWebmailexa] > w

The certificate should immediately be applied and loaded into the web server. Check https://whatsmychaincert.com again: the certificate chain should now be correct and it will survive reboots as well \o/

Of course, if you ever change the certificate in the WebAdmin UI, you will have to do this again.

The UTM software really should save the certificates in the configuration data this way by default, with all the intermediate certs attached, but for some reason it doesn't ...

Am I right if I say that this issue still isn' t fixed?

It is great that there are workarounds like for example provided by PatMaN93, but I prefer to not login into the terminal (I don't want to mess with Sophos or do things that you shoudn't be doing).
For that reason, I'm asking, after seeying so many topics on the Sophos comunnity, is it still not fixed?

Because I'm sorry but I'm not going to mess in the terminal, although I really do want my certificate to work.

And this is a real old problem, witch, in my honest opinion, should be fixed by now - right??

It is not fixed.  Below is the response I received from support on the case that I opened. 

From: Sophos Support
Sent: 2017-Jan-17 01:41 PM

Based on what you are saying in your last message it sound like you are hitting a known issue where the UTM does not provide the full certificate chain for requests made to WebAdmin or User Portal in the event intermediate certificates are used.  There is a workaround for this issue, which is what was mentioned in the community thread you linked. From the backend of the UTM we can append the WebAdmin CA and intermediate CA(s) in one pem file and copy it to /var/sec/chroot-httpd/etc/httpd/WebAdminCertCA.pem. The downside to this workaround is that it would need to be re-applied after each firmware upgrade.

In the long run the general solution would be to implement a mechanism to handle intermediate certificates through the standard workflow although unfortunately I do not have any ETA on a formal solution. In the meantime though this workaround should get you up and running and is relatively easily applied after any upgrade of the UTM firmware.

Okay then, that is unfortunate.

Well, I hope they fix it soon!!

Thank you