How do I install a root certificate?

Question

Can anyone point me to a good tutorial on installing a root certificate on Ubuntu?

I've been provided with a .crt file. I gather that need to create a directory at /usr/share/ca-certificates/newdomain.org and place the .crt in that directory. Beyond that I'm not sure how to proceed.

If anybody is landing here with a cer file instead of a crt, they're the same thing (just with a different extension). You should be able to follow these answers and just substitute the filename. — Oli, Jan 23 '14 at 10:19
Btw: for a convenient way to get CA certificates from command line, look here, on serverfault. — Frank N, Aug 09 '18 at 08:48
Is there not a UX problem if there are 9 different answers? Does Ubuntu have a UserVoice? — Luke Puplett, Feb 18 '20 at 13:06
Official docs can be found here https://ubuntu.com/server/docs/security-trust-store — Stefan Horning, Mar 01 '22 at 12:53

score 497 · Accepted Answer · edited Feb 18 '22 at 18:11

497

Given a CA certificate file foo.crt, follow these steps to install it on Ubuntu:

Create a directory for extra CA certificates in /usr/local/share/ca-certificates:
```
sudo mkdir /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/extra
```

Copy the CA .crt file to this directory:

sudo cp foo.crt /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/extra/foo.crt

Let Ubuntu add the .crt file's path relative to /usr/local/share/ca-certificates to /etc/ca-certificates.conf:
```
sudo dpkg-reconfigure ca-certificates
```
To do this non-interactively, run:
```
sudo update-ca-certificates
```

In case of a .pem file on Ubuntu, it must first be converted to a .crt file:

openssl x509 -in foo.pem -inform PEM -out foo.crt

Or a .cer file can be converted to a .crt file:

openssl x509 -inform DER -in foo.cer -out foo.crt

edited Feb 18 '22 at 18:11

BeastOfCaerbannog

14,585

answered Jan 12 '12 at 12:37

Bai

7,760

15

Note that Firefox (and maybe some other software) don't use the system-wide certificates, but has its own certificate store: http://askubuntu.com/a/248326/79344. – Amir Ali Akbari Jun 06 '15 at 17:51
1

This method is not functional on Ubuntu 16.04, you might wish to revise your answer. – Luís de Sousa Aug 16 '16 at 07:35
1

Does this work for removal too? I.e. is it enough to remove the files and do dpkg-reconfigure again to delete the extra CA? – clorz Feb 01 '17 at 20:16
After losing my mind on this for way too long, I think I got it worked out with Ubuntu 16.04. One thing that was killing me is that my organization handed out a OUR_ORGANIZATION_ROOT_CA.crt file with instructions for adding it to Firefox. No prob. Then I figured out Chrome. No prob. Then curl and all who depend on it started croaking with fatal errors about certificates. Turns out this file extension was .crt but it was NOT in PEM format. @steakunderscore's comment above SAVED MY SANITY. The -inform DERoption made the difference; -inform PEM didn't work. – David Feb 27 '17 at 17:36
2

sudo dpkg-reconfigure ca-certificates Thanks, the other sudo update-ca-certificates --fresh didn't work on 16.10. – antivirtel Mar 02 '17 at 11:29
since dpkg-reconfigure ca-certificates is interactive it cant be automated with ansible. better use sudo update-ca-certificates in that case – Michael Niemand Mar 06 '17 at 15:21
Note that for Chromium you don't use site wide certificates. Neither of the instructions below would produce intended result in the web browser. – Sergei G May 24 '17 at 04:16
2

Note that Chromium and Firefox do not use the system ca certificates, so require separate instructions. For chromium, visit chrome://settings/certificates, click Authorities, then click import, and select your .crt. In Firefox, visit about:preferences#advanced, click Certificates, View Certificates, Authorities, then click Import and select your .crt. – jbeard4 Sep 27 '17 at 19:15
7

PEM and crt are two unrelated things. PEM is an encoding (contrast with .DER) while crt is just a naming convention to indicate the contents (contrast with .key) – Gerald Sep 06 '18 at 10:09
3

@Marian I think that conversion command works even when input PEM is actually certificate chain instead of a single X.509 certificate (you cannot be sure what's inside *.pem until reading the content). In that case it is not simple file-copying. – Franklin Yu Sep 11 '18 at 20:56
For those who still fail after this approach: My company delivered both .pem files and .crt files. However, I had to generate my own .crt files from .pem files using the above-mentioned tool in order for them to work correctly. – mattgately Nov 13 '19 at 17:00
For my case with Ubuntu 16.04, No output: locate foo.crt and the output : sudo cp foo.crt /usr/share/ca-certificates/extra/foo.crt is: cp: cannot stat 'foo.crt': No such file or directory. Sadly, I first removed ca-certificates. How I can fix it, please? – REDHWAN Jun 07 '20 at 03:30
For Ubuntu 20.04 I tried installing it in the local ca-certificates folder /usr/local/share/ca-certificates as suggested by @gertvdijk, but the certificate wasn't found by the update process. – magikid Feb 02 '21 at 21:26
4

Confirm that for 20.04, these instructions work if the file is put into /usr/share/ca-certificates/extra – Raphael Jul 08 '21 at 09:51
Confirm that for 20.04, these instructions work if the file is put into /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/extra – stackprotector Mar 03 '22 at 10:46
Does update-ca-certificates automatically symlink the newly added files into /etc/ssl/certs? – Gergely Lukacsy Aug 03 '23 at 16:15

score 270 · Answer 2 · edited Nov 04 '16 at 12:53

270

Given a CA certificate file 'foo.crt', follow these steps to install it on Ubuntu:

First, copy your CA to dir /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/

sudo cp foo.crt /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/foo.crt

then, update CA store

sudo update-ca-certificates

That's all. You should get this output:

Updating certificates in /etc/ssl/certs... 1 added, 0 removed; done.
Running hooks in /etc/ca-certificates/update.d....
Adding debian:foo.pem
done.
done.

No file is needed to edit. Link to your CA is created automatically.

Please note that the certificate filenames have to end in .crt, otherwise the update-ca-certificates script won't pick up on them.

This procedure works also in newer versions: manuals.

edited Nov 04 '16 at 12:53

Franc Drobnič

169

answered Nov 15 '13 at 17:44

Frantisek Boranek

2,701

1

this seems not to work in trusty tahr 14.04 – mcantsin Mar 28 '14 at 19:21
33

Please note that, unlike adding to /usr/share/ca-certificates, this seems to only work if they're directly in /usr/local/share/ca-certificates and not a subdirectory. +1 for using local folder instead of system folder! – Tobias J Apr 08 '14 at 05:11
Use this command to convert *.pem to *.crt: openssl x509 -outform der -in in_file.pem -out out_file.crt – Nelson G. Jun 01 '16 at 10:20
2

This is documented in README.Debian. – pevik Aug 24 '16 at 09:32
1

I had to do openssl x509 -outform pem -in in_file.pem -out out_file.crt. Got complaints about "multiple certificates" in the CRT file if I did -outform der. – Dave Hein Dec 29 '16 at 20:50
1

@Sparky1, This should be the accepted answer. – Drew Chapin Feb 17 '17 at 12:46
works on Debian 8.8 (Jessie) with ownCloud application – Sergei G May 26 '17 at 06:12
Step 0: for a convenient way to get CA certificates from command line, look here, on serverfault. – Frank N Aug 09 '18 at 08:47
@pevik Link dead. This is a versioned one that won't expire. – Franklin Yu Sep 11 '18 at 20:46
1

@FranklinYu thanks :) Debian moved from Alioth to Salsa, this would work as well: https://salsa.debian.org/debian/ca-certificates/raw/master/debian/README.Debian, but sources.debian.org is better. – pevik Sep 12 '18 at 12:47
3

Thanks! It works in 18.04 as well, the first answer with copying the crt file /usr/share/ca-certificates/extra doesn't seem to work however. – QPTR Jan 17 '19 at 16:25
I didn't know it had to be a .crt file, so this answer was super helpful. Thanks! – Sienna Oct 13 '19 at 15:43
For those who still fail after this approach: My company delivered both .pem files and .crt files. However, I had to generate my own .crt files from .pem files using the above-mentioned tool in order for them to work correctly. I think it was because multiple certificates in single CRT – mattgately Nov 13 '19 at 17:02

score 26 · Answer 3 · edited Jan 31 '23 at 11:49

Clarification between update-ca-certificates and dpkg-reconfigure ca-certificates and why one works and the other does not!!

update-ca-certificates or sudo update-ca-certificates will only work if /etc/ca-certificates.conf has been updated.
/etc/ca-certificate.conf is only updated once you ran dpkg-reconfigure ca-certificates which updates the certificate names to be imported into /etc/ca-certificates.conf.

This is stated in the header of the /etc/ca-certificates.conf file:

# This file lists certificates that you wish to use or to ignore to be
# installed in /etc/ssl/certs.
# update-ca-certificates(8) will update /etc/ssl/certs by reading this file.
#
# This is autogenerated by dpkg-reconfigure ca-certificates.  <=======
# Certificates should be installed under /usr/share/ca-certificates
# and files with extension '.crt' is recognized as available certs.
#
# line begins with # is comment.
# line begins with ! is certificate filename to be deselected.
#
mozilla/ACCVRAIZ1.crt
mozilla/AC_RAIZ_FNMT-RCM.crt
mozilla/Actalis_Authentication_Root_CA.crt
mozilla/AddTrust_External_Root.crt
...

As you can see, the format in /etc/ca-certificates.conf is <folder name>/<.crt name>

So in order to use update-ca-certificates or sudo update-ca-certificates you could do the following to import a .crt:

Create a directory for extra CA certificates in /usr/share/ca-certificates:
```
 sudo mkdir /usr/share/ca-certificates/extra
```

Copy the .crt file to this directory:

 sudo cp foo.crt /usr/share/ca-certificates/extra/foo.crt

Append a line to /etc/ca-certificates.conf using <folder name>/<.crt name>:
```
 echo "extra/foo.crt" | sudo tee -a /etc/ca-certificates.conf
```

Update certs non-interactively with sudo update-ca-certificates

 $ sudo update-ca-certificates
 ...
 Updating certificates in /etc/ssl/certs...
 1 added, 0 removed; done.

For my case with Ubuntu 16.04, No output: locate foo.crt and the output : sudo cp foo.crt /usr/share/ca-certificates/extra/foo.crt is: cp: cannot stat 'foo.crt': No such file or directory. Sadly, I first removed ca-certificates. How I can fix it, please? — REDHWAN, Jun 07 '20 at 03:28
On Ubuntu 20.04 LTS, there is no need to use the interactive dpkg-reconfigure ca-certificates. update-ca-certificates adds a certificate from a newly created folder like /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/extra successfully. — stackprotector, Mar 03 '22 at 10:51

score 14 · Answer 4 · edited Oct 13 '18 at 21:11

Install a Certificate Authority on Ubuntu

I have tested this on Ubuntu 14.04.

Here is my solution, I looked and looked for a long time trying to figure out how to get this to work.

Extract the .cer from browser. I used IE 11.
- Settings -> Internet Options -> Intermediate Certificate Authorities
- Select The Certificate Authority You Want To Export (certutil -config - -ping will show you the ones you are using if you are behind a corporate proxy)
- Export -> Select The Format You Want To Use: DER Encoded .cer
Get the .cer files to Ubuntu somehow
Convert to .crt openssl x509 -inform DER -in certificate.cer -out certificate.crt
Make extra directory sudo mkdir /usr/share/ca-certificates/extra
Copy certificates over sudo cp certificate.crt /usr/share/ca-certificates/extra/certificate.crt
sudo update-ca-certificates
If not, then you have to do what I did, go to sudo nano /etc/ca-certificates.conf
Scroll down and find your .cer and remove the ! from in front of the file name (update-ca-certificates doc) - if you don't find your certificate run dpkg-reconfigure ca-certificates
Run sudo update-ca-certificates
You may need to individually trust the CAs from Firefox, Chrome, etc.. , I needed it to work with Docker so after these steps it worked with Docker.

@endolith worked for me in 16.04. – Shubham Jul 25 '17 at 06:19 — Shubham, Jul 25 '17 at 06:19
thanks for point no 10 – Sai Teja Pakalapati Jun 01 '20 at 11:08 — Sai Teja Pakalapati, Jun 01 '20 at 11:08

score 4 · Answer 5 · edited May 14 '19 at 21:52

4

Other answers didn't work for me with Ubuntu 18.04. Append the certificate cert to /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt using the following command:

cat YOUR_CERT_HERE.crt >> /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt

edited May 14 '19 at 21:52

mahatmanich

669
7
13

answered Nov 06 '18 at 21:34

Jasmit Tarang

49
1
1

1

2 hours of messing about with import commands before I found this. Perfect! – beirtipol Feb 14 '19 at 16:07
The command is wrong, the final s is missing: cat YOUR_CERT_HERE.crt >> /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt. Thanks for this solution. – SommerEngineering Apr 15 '19 at 14:31
4

Note: This is the temporary solution, as the added certificate is going to be removed after running update-ca-certificates. – kenorb May 17 '19 at 10:49
what is removed? I haven't seen my certificate removed. – Someone Special Mar 17 '21 at 09:24
1

I get permission denied on this, even with sudo at the beginning: sudo cat DigiCertGlobalRootCA.crt >> /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt bash: /etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt: Permission denied – Alex Mi Feb 01 '23 at 19:33

score 3 · Answer 6 · edited Jun 29 '12 at 09:45

3

Have the (root / CA) certificate available on a web server, local to your network if you like.

Browse to it with Firefox.
Open the cert and tell Firefox to add it as an exception.
Firefox will ask you whether you want to trust this certificate for identifying websites, for e-mail users or for software publishers.
Enjoy!

Update: It will be necessary to check if this works on Ubuntu 11. I've realised that I just did this on Ubuntu 12.04 LTS.

edited Jun 29 '12 at 09:45

Eliah Kagan

117,780

answered Jun 29 '12 at 05:54

Ian Green

31
1

6

hasn't firefox its own certificate container? If one would add a certificate this way, just firefox would be able to use it, wouldn't it? – Aiyion.Prime Mar 23 '15 at 16:47
That does not work at all, you still have to add it to the global cert container of the OS, otherwise it only will be in the Firefox container. – arc_lupus Apr 04 '16 at 07:25

score 2 · Answer 7 · answered May 17 '19 at 11:07

Here are the simple steps:

Install CA certificates to allow SSL-based applications to check for the authenticity of SSL connections:
```
sudo apt-get install ca-certificates
```
Copy certificate file (crt or .cer) into /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/ folder, e.g.:
```
sudo cp file.crt /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/
```
For PEM file, see: Convert .pem to .crt and .key.

Optionally, if using Charles proxy, this command can work:
```
curl -L chls.pro/ssl | sudo tee /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/charles.crt
```
Update certificates:
```
sudo update-ca-certificates
```
The command will update /etc/ssl/certs directory to hold SSL certificates and generates ca-certificates.crt file (a concatenated single-file list of certificates).

Note: Don't add certificates manually (as suggested here), as they are not persistent and going to be removed.

^{Note: If you're running as root, you can drop the sudo from the above commands.}

score 1 · Answer 8 · answered Mar 29 '18 at 21:26

To add a Root CA certificate in FireFox is now-a-days very easy. Just open preferences, go to "Privacy & Security", scroll down to "Certificates" and click "View Certificates...". Here you can click "Import Certificate". Point to your root CA (.pem) and OK. That's all folks.

score 1 · Answer 9 · answered Oct 28 '11 at 18:05

1

From here:

Installing the Certificate

You can install the key file example.key and certificate file example.crt, or the certificate file issued by your CA, by running following commands at a terminal prompt:

sudo cp example.crt /etc/ssl/certs
sudo cp example.key /etc/ssl/private

Now simply configure any applications, with the ability to use public-key cryptography, to use the certificate and key files. For example, Apache can provide HTTPS, Dovecot can provide IMAPS and POP3S, etc.

answered Oct 28 '11 at 18:05

jat255

728
6
17

Should have read more closely... It looks like that's not for root certificates. That page that I linked to though has information about root certificates that might be useful. – jat255 Oct 28 '11 at 18:06
1

I don't have a public key and a private key, I just have a .crt so unfortunately those instruction don't seem to apply. – Sparky1 Oct 28 '11 at 19:01

How do I install a root certificate?

9 Answers9

Install a Certificate Authority on Ubuntu

Installing the Certificate

Linked