One of the most popular commands in SSL to create, convert, manage the SSL Certificates is OpenSSL. There will be many situations where you have to deal with OpenSSL in various ways, and here I have listed them for you as a handy cheat sheet. In this article, I will talk about frequently used OpenSSL commands to help you in the real world. Some of the abbreviations related to certificates.
SSL – Secure Socket Layer CSR – Certificate Signing Request TLS – Transport Layer Security PEM – Privacy Enhanced Mail DER – Distinguished Encoding Rules SHA – Secure Hash Algorithm PKCS – Public-Key Cryptography Standards
Note: SSL/TLS operation course would be helpful if you are not familiar with the terms.
Create a new Private Key and Certificate Signing Request
The above command will generate CSR and a 2048-bit RSA key file. If you intend to use this certificate in Apache or Nginx, then you need to send this CSR file to certificate issuer authority, and they will give you a signed certificate mostly in der or pem format which you need to configure in Apache or Nginx web server.
Create a Self-Signed Certificate
The above command will generate a self-signed certificate and key file with 2048-bit RSA. I have also included sha256 as it’s considered most secure at the moment. Tip: by default, it will generate a self-signed certificate valid for only one month so you may consider defining –days parameter to extend the validity. Ex: to have self-signed valid for two years.
Verify CSR file
Verification is essential to ensure you are sending CSR to issuer authority with the required details.
Create RSA Private Key
If you just need to generate RSA private key, you can use the above command. I have included 2048 for stronger encryption.
Remove Passphrase from Key
If you are using passphrase in key file and using Apache then every time you start, you have to enter the password. If you are annoyed with entering a password, then you can use the above openssl rsa -in geekflare.key -check to remove the passphrase key from an existing key.
Verify Private Key
If you doubt your key file, you can use the above command to check.
Verify Certificate File
If you would like to validate certificate data like CN, OU, etc. then you can use an above command which will give you certificate details.
Verify the Certificate Signer Authority
Certificate issuer authority signs every certificate and in case you need to check them.
Check Hash Value of A Certificate
Convert DER to PEM format
Usually, the certificate authority will give you SSL cert in .der format, and if you need to use them in apache or .pem format then the above command will help you.
Convert PEM to DER format
In case you need to change .pem format to .der
Convert Certificate and Private Key to PKCS#12 format
If you need to use a cert with the java application or with any other who accept only PKCS#12 format, you can use the above command, which will generate single pfx containing certificate & key file. Tip: you can also include chain certificate by passing –chain as below.
Create CSR using an existing private key
If you don’t want to create a new private key instead of using an existing one, you can go with the above command.
Check contents of PKCS12 format cert
PKCS12 is a binary format so you won’t be able to view the content in notepad or another editor. The above command will help you to see the contents of the PKCS12 file.
Convert PKCS12 format to PEM certificate
If you wish to use existing pkcs12 format with Apache or just in pem format, this will be useful.
Test SSL certificate of particular URL
I use this quite often to validate the SSL certificate of a particular URL from the server. This is very handy to validate the protocol, cipher, and cert details.
Find out OpenSSL version
If you are responsible for ensuring OpenSSL is secure then probably one of the first things you got to do is to verify the version.
Check PEM File Certificate Expiration Date
Useful if you are planning to put some monitoring to check the validity. It will show you a date in notBefore and notAfter syntax. notAfter is one you will have to verify to confirm if a certificate is expired or still valid. Ex:
Check Certificate Expiration Date of SSL URL
Another useful if you are planning to monitor SSL cert expiration date remotely or particular URL. Ex:
Check if SSL V2 or V3 is accepted on URL
To check SSL V2 To Check SSL V3 To Check TLS 1.0 To Check TLS 1.1 To Check TLS 1.2 If you are securing a web server and need to validate if SSL V2/V3 is enabled or not, you can use the above command. If activated, you will get “CONNECTED” else “handshake failure.”
Verify if the particular cipher is accepted on URL
If you are working on security findings and pen test results show some of the weak ciphers is accepted then to validate, you can use the above command. Of course, you will have to change the cipher and URL, which you want to test against. If the mentioned cipher is accepted, then you will get “CONNECTED” else “handshake failure.” I hope the above commands help you to know more about OpenSSL to manage SSL certificates for your website.
