Knowledge Base

Prerequisites:   Upon successful completion of the certificate validation, you would have received the certificate and intermediate certificate bundle from Sectigo.

Server Certificate : yourDomainName.crt
Intermediate Certificate: yourDomainName.ca-bundle

You have to link them together into a single file, so that you can use it with NGINX server. You can use the following command to build a bundle file.

> cat yourDomainName.crt yourDomainName.ca-bundle > ssl-bundle.crt
 

Note: If you have not the received the 'ca-bundle' file in the ZIP that we sent you, you can download it from this article's attachments. (End of this page)

For our SCM 'Sectigo Certificate Manager' customers: since you receive multiple downloadable links you must make sure that you download the x.509 base64 encoded 'Certificate Only' as well as the Root/Intermediate 'Certificate only' files. You will be presented with .cer formatted files which you can change the file extension to .crt to complete the process above.

 

Installation:

1. Store the bundle in the appropriate nginx ssl folder

EX :

> mkdir -p /etc/nginx/ssl/example_com/

> cp ssl-bundle.crt /etc/nginx/ssl/example_com/

2. Store your private key in the appropriate nginx ssl folder,

EX :

> cp example_com.key /etc/nginx/ssl/example_com/

 

3. Make sure your nginx config points to the right cert file and to the private key you generated earlier:

server {
listen 443;
server_name domainname.com;
ssl on;
ssl_certificate /etc/nginx/ssl/example_com/ssl-bundle.crt;
ssl_certificate_key /etc/nginx/ssl/example_com/example_com.key;

ssl_protocols TLSv1.1, TLSv1.2;
ssl_ciphers HIGH:!aNULL:!MD5;
}

Note: If you are using a multi-domain or wildcard certificate, it is necessary to modify the configuration files for each domain/subdomain included in the certificate. You would need to specify the domain/subdomain you need to secure and refer to the same certificate files in the VirtualHost record the way described above.

 

4. OCSP Stapling Support:[ Optional ]

Although optional, it is highly recommended to enable OCSP Stapling which will improve the SSL handshake speed of your website. NginX has OCSP Stapling functionality enabled since version 1.3.7.

In order to use OCSP Stapling in NginX, you must set the following in your configuration:

## OCSP Stapling
resolver 127.0.0.1;
ssl_stapling on;
ssl_stapling_verify on;
ssl_trusted_certificate <file>;

Where <file> is the location and filename (path) of the ca certificate bundle.

 

Note 1: For ssl_stapling_verify and ssl_stapling to work, you must ensure that all necessary intermediates and root certificates are installed.

Note 2: The resolver name may change based on your environment.

 

5. After making changes to your config file check the file for syntax errors before attempting to use it. The following command will check for errors:

> sudo nginx -t -c /etc/nginx/nginx.conf

 

6. Restart your server. Run the following command to do it:

> sudo /etc/init.d/nginx restart

 

7. To verify if your certificate is installed correctly, use our Qualys SSL Server Test.

 
If you want a more pre-defined, secure configuration, please check Mozilla SSL Configuration Generator

 

Reference : http://nginx.org/en/docs/http/configuring_https_servers.html

 

Related Articles:

• CSR Generation: Using OpenSSL (Apache w/mod_ssl, NGINX, OS X)
• Enable OCSP Stapling on NGINX