Cloudflare SSL & Geekzone

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gzt

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#153555 30-Sep-2014 21:08

What does Cloudflare's SSL announcement mean for sites like Geekzone?

This morning we began rolling out the Universal SSL across all our current customers. We expect this process to be complete for all current customers before the end of the day. Yesterday, there were about 2 million sites active on the Internet that supported encrypted connections. By the end of the day today, we'll have doubled that.

https://blog.cloudflare.com/introducing-universal-ssl/

timmmay

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#1144549 30-Sep-2014 21:32

Interesting... so they'll enable SSL for every customers website, even without an SSL certificate? Ah, it's SSL to Cloudflare, then http the rest of the way. That seems kindof pointless.

ripdog

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#1144555 30-Sep-2014 21:38

Optionally you can do http between CF and your server, to make it easy for newbies. This doesn't make it 'pointless', it just means it's not as good as it could be. And I'd imagine it'd be a lot harder to intercept connections between CF and servers than it would be to sniff traffic on that malware-laden WinXP box connecting to CF.

If you care about security, CF also allows you to connect via HTTPS to the backend, optionally validating the SSL cert. In the future they will let you generate internal CF SSL certs in the Web UI and install them on your web server, providing end-to-end security with little hassle.

hio77

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#1144558 30-Sep-2014 21:44

was reading this morning before a catnap... will be interesting to see if/how many people have issues with lack of ECDSA support, looking at the stats its likely a null issue, but regardless.

be good to see SPDY out there alot more, although for GZ i could see this not being SO important.

My one concern is companys who will use this as a cheap way to avoid buying their own ssl certs, or it being a common tool for phishing sites to look more legitimate. - how many people do you know that look for the padlock to know they are ok with banking now?

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Any comments made are personal opinion and do not reflect directly on the position my current or past employers may have.

ripdog

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#1144559 30-Sep-2014 21:48

StartSSL already offers free certs with basically no verification. You type in your info, a staff member looks at it and gives you the okay. You get a cert. There already isn't a barrier for phishers, this move is only a good thing for getting amateur websites on SSL incredibly easily. More encryption is only a good thing.

Admittedly, this does make CF into a gigantic MITM attack. Well, it always was when it processed SSL on paid plans (AFAIK), so if you want to keep your data safe from the government, stick to self-hosting a hidden service on tor.

freitasm

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#1144563 30-Sep-2014 22:02

We use Cloudflare Pro and have had SSL-enabled the site for years (even before using Cloudflare), where it is necessary - login, registration, profile, image gallery and most importantly the PM part. We adopted SSL for the PM part mainly because a lot of telcos use the PMs to talk to customers and also our users need a bit of privacy when exchanging their private messages.

If you go to any of those pages using Chrome and the right add-ons you will see that all those pages are srved over SPDY, since this was enabled on Cloudflare Pro already.

What does it mean for Geekzone now? Nothing changes.

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timmmay

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#1144712 1-Oct-2014 11:05

So can free plan Cloudflare customers use SSL no charge if they have an SSL certificate?

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ripdog

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#1144802 1-Oct-2014 12:52

No need for a cert. Cloudflare give you a free comodo cert. Well, you can't export it, but it's free for the life of your cloudflare account.

timmmay

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#1144821 1-Oct-2014 13:50

Ah cool. Their documentation is a bit widely spread and not so concise.

mattwnz

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#1144865 1-Oct-2014 14:50

If you are using it with shared hosting, wouldn't you still need a dedicated IP which shared hosts will charge you for? Also many will charge a setup fee to install at the server end.

ripdog

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#1144881 1-Oct-2014 14:53

mattwnz: If you are using it with shared hosting, wouldn't you still need a dedicated IP which shared hosts will charge you for? Also many will charge a setup fee to install at the server end.

No, that's what Server Name Indication is for. As long as you have a decently modern http server and browsers connecting.

mattwnz

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#1144892 1-Oct-2014 15:25

ripdog:
mattwnz: If you are using it with shared hosting, wouldn't you still need a dedicated IP which shared hosts will charge you for? Also many will charge a setup fee to install at the server end.

No, that's what Server Name Indication is for. As long as you have a decently modern http server and browsers connecting.

It would still need installing by the server admin wouldn't it, which usually costs?

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ripdog

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#1145385 2-Oct-2014 09:58

mattwnz:
ripdog:
mattwnz: If you are using it with shared hosting, wouldn't you still need a dedicated IP which shared hosts will charge you for? Also many will charge a setup fee to install at the server end.

No, that's what Server Name Indication is for. As long as you have a decently modern http server and browsers connecting.

It would still need installing by the server admin wouldn't it, which usually costs?

Nothing needs to be installed to use cloudflare. Simply switch your DNS to point at cloudflare servers (after signing up, of course :)).

If you're talking about the certs that cloudflare will offer *in the future* for CF->backend SSL, then yes, you're right. The current CF->client certs are being provisioned completely automatically.

In the meantime you can make a self-signed cert or a free startSSL cert for securing CF->backend.

timmmay

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#1145399 2-Oct-2014 10:03

Every time I try to go to the https version of my site that's in cloudflare I get certificate warnings.

hio77

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#1145401 2-Oct-2014 10:06

timmmay: Every time I try to go to the https version of my site that's in cloudflare I get certificate warnings.

for what reason is there warnings? your browser should tell you..

#include <std_disclaimer>

Any comments made are personal opinion and do not reflect directly on the position my current or past employers may have.

ripdog

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#1145403 2-Oct-2014 10:11

Those warnings mean your cert has not yet been provisioned. If in doubt, read the blog...