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Self Signed & Free Certificates

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Self-Signed Certificates

  • Generated using OpenSSL: You can generate these certificates yourself without any cost.
  • Not Trusted by Browsers: Browsers and operating systems do not recognize self-signed certificates as trusted because they are not signed by a recognized Certificate Authority (CA). This results in security warnings when users visit your site.
  • Use Cases: Self-signed certificates are typically used for internal testing, development environments, or intranets where trust can be manually configured.

Let's Encrypt Certificates

  • Generated using Let's Encrypt: Let's Encrypt is a free, automated, and open CA that provides SSL/TLS certificates.
  • Trusted by Browsers: Certificates from Let's Encrypt are recognized and trusted by all major browsers, ensuring that users won't see security warnings when visiting your site.
  • Automation: The process can be automated using tools like Certbot, which handles the issuance and renewal of certificates.
  • Free: These certificates are provided at no cost.

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LetsEncrypt


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Apache 

https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-secure-apache-with-let-s-encrypt-on-centos-7  

Running certbot for a single domain

sudo certbot --apache -d example.com
Running certbot for multiple domains (or subdomains)

sudo certbot --apache -d example.com -d www.example.com

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Nginx 

https://www.digitalocean.com/community/tutorials/how-to-secure-nginx-with-let-s-encrypt-on-ubuntu-20-04   

Generate a certificate to be manually installed

certbot certonly -manual -d example.com -d example.com --webroot -w /path/to/doc/root