10/26/22, 8:39 AM Enable https on Ubuntu Web Server (20.

04) | IT Blog

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written by Zeljko Medic

December 14th, 2020

Enable https on
Ubuntu Web Server
(20.04)
We went through LAMP stack installation
on Ubuntu Server. Now we will enable
https by installing mod_ssl and creating
self-signed certificate.

Before we begin

As a prerequisite, you should have

Apache2 installed and firewall configured
for port 443. I already went through that.

I have web server on address

http://192.168.60.3

If I try to reach it on https://192.168.60.3

this is what I get

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10/26/22, 8:39 AM Enable https on Ubuntu Web Server (20.04) | IT Blog

Enable mod_ssl

mod_ssl is apache module which enables

ssl/https.

We need to enable it

sudo a2enmod ssl

As last sentence suggest, we should restart

apache2

sudo systemctl restart

apache2

Create SSL Certificate

Following command will create self signed

certificate with public and private key
named ssl1. Cet will be valid for 1 year
(365 days)

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10/26/22, 8:39 AM Enable https on Ubuntu Web Server (20.04) | IT Blog

sudo openssl req -x509 -nodes

-days 365 -newkey rsa:2048 -
keyout
/etc/ssl/private/ssl1.key -
out /etc/ssl/certs/ssl1.crt

Country Name (2 letter code)

[XX]:HR
State or Province Name (full
name) []:YourState
Locality Name (eg, city)
[Default City]:YourCity
Organization Name (eg,
company) [Default Company
Ltd]:YourCompany
Organizational Unit Name (eg,
section) []:YourDept
Common Name (eg, your name or
your server's hostname)
[]:your_domain_or_ip
Email Address
[]:[email protected]

!!! For this test in common name I entered

my IP address – in that field in production
system you will put domain name of your
web.

In my case that would be informaticar.net

Configure Apache to use

SSL

We need to create new config file in

/etc/apache2/sites-available to enable ssl to
work.

Enter following

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10/26/22, 8:39 AM Enable https on Ubuntu Web Server (20.04) | IT Blog

sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-

available/your_domain_or_ip.c
onf

I will enter 192.168.60.3.conf for a name.

Enter following into your conf file

<VirtualHost *:443>
ServerName
your_domain_or_ip
DocumentRoot
/var/www/your_domain_or_ip

SSLEngine on
SSLCertificateFile
/etc/ssl/certs/ssl1.crt
SSLCertificateKeyFile
/etc/ssl/private/ssl1.key
</VirtualHost>

As you can see from the screenshot, under

server name I also specified 192.168.60.3
since I also generated cert with
192.168.60.3.

Under document root, you will enter

location of your website files. For this
tutorial I used /var/www/html which has in
it default apache2 webpage.

We will now enable our configuration by

entering

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10/26/22, 8:39 AM Enable https on Ubuntu Web Server (20.04) | IT Blog

sudo a2ensite
your_domain_or_ip.conf

Then we will test it by entering

sudo apache2ctl configtest

You can see the results of the success in the

screenshot below. AH00558 message is ok,
you can ignore it. Output Syntax OK is
signal that we need.

We also need to reboot our apache2

webserver

sudo systemctl reload apache2

We will now test our website again by

entering

https://192.168.60.3

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10/26/22, 8:39 AM Enable https on Ubuntu Web Server (20.04) | IT Blog

We can also see certificate details. Website

uses cert we created earlier.

HTTP to HTTPS
redirection

As a bonus step, we will redirect HTTP

traffic to HTTPS.

We will edit 192.168.60.3.conf file we

created above in this guide.

sudo nano /etc/apache2/sites-

available/your_domain_or_ip.c
onf

At the bottom of the file we will create

another block with following

<VirtualHost *:80>
ServerName
your_domain_or_ip
Redirect /
https://your_domain_or_ip/
</VirtualHost>

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This is how my config file looks like:

We will again test our config and reboot

apache2

sudo apachectl configtest

sudo systemctl reload apache2

After I entered http://192.168.60.3 I was

automagically transfered to
https://192.168.60.3

That is it, we now secured our web server

with HTTPS.

Disclaimer

Posted in Linux · Tagged Enable https on

Ubuntu LAMP, Enable https on Ubuntu
Web Server, Enable mod_ssl Ubuntu

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