Activating SSL encryption
After you have generated a key-pair file and installed your certificate, you can activate SSL for your administration server. See the documentation for individual servers if you want to enable encryption in them.
- In the Server Manager, choose Admin Preferences|Encryption On/Off. The Encryption On/Off form appears.
- Check the On radio button.
- In the drop-down list, choose the alias for the key-pair file and certificate file that you want to use. You must know the password for the key-pair file referenced by this alias--it's the password you must enter before starting or stopping a server that uses SSL encryption.
- Set any security preferences you want.
- Stop your server, then restart it, from the command-line or NT control panel. You'll be prompted to enter the password for the key-pair alias you used.
URLs to an SSL-enabled administration server are constructed using https instead of simply http. URLs that point to documents on an SSL-enabled server have this format:
https://<servername.[domain.[dom]]:[port#]>
For example, https://admin.mozilla.com:443. If you use the default secure http port number (443), you don't have to use the port number in the URL.
Setting security (SSL) preferences
You can set preferences for using SSL encryption on the administration server.
- Go to the Server Manager and choose Server Preferences|Encryption Preferences.
- Check the SSL versions you want your server to communicate with. The latest and most secure version is SSL version 3, but many older clients use only SSL version 2. You will probably want to enable your server to use both versions.
- Check the ciphers you want your server to use. The ciphers are listed for each version of SSL. A cipher is the algorithm used in encryption. Some ciphers are more secure, or stronger, than others. Generally speaking, the more bits a cipher uses during encryption, the harder it is to decrypt the data. Ciphers are described after this list.
- Click OK. Make sure you restart your server.
When a navigator initiates an SSL connection with a server, it lets the server know what ciphers it prefers to use to encrypt information. In any two-way encryption process, both parties must use the same ciphers. Since there are a number of ciphers available, you should consider enabling all ciphers.
- You can choose ciphers from both the SSL 2 and SSL 3 protocols. Unless you have a compelling reason why you don't want to use a specific cipher, you should check them all.
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