[Solved] Error: SSL certificate problem: self signed certificate in certificate chain

 While creating a ubuntu machine in vagrant recently faced a issue where the image download failed with a SSL error as mentioned below

Error:-

$ vagrant up
Bringing machine 'default' up with 'virtualbox' provider...
==> default: Box 'krec/ubuntu2004-x64' could not be found. Attempting to find and install...
    default: Box Provider: virtualbox
    default: Box Version: >= 0
The box 'krec/ubuntu2004-x64' could not be found or
could not be accessed in the remote catalog. If this is a private
box on HashiCorp's Vagrant Cloud, please verify you're logged in via
`vagrant login`. Also, please double-check the name. The expanded
URL and error message are shown below:

URL: ["https://vagrantcloud.com/krec/ubuntu2004-x64"]
Error: SSL certificate problem: self signed certificate in certificate chain

 

Cause:-

If you're encountering a "self signed certificate in certificate chain" error when using Vagrant, it means that the SSL certificate used by the server you're connecting to is not trusted by your system because it is self-signed or not signed by a trusted authority. This can be a security risk, so there can be 2 cases

1. In some cases(testing) it may be acceptable to temporarily disable certificate validation for testing or development purposes.

2. you need to use a self-signed certificate for SSL/TLS connections in a production environment, you can add the certificate to the trusted certificates on your system.

Based on your use case you can implement any of the solution mentioned below

Solution 1:-

To disable certificate validation in Vagrant, you can add the following line anywhere in your Vagrantfile :

config.vm.box_download_insecure = true

This will allow Vagrant to download the box file without validating the SSL certificate of the server. Note that this is not recommended for production environments or situations where security is a concern.

Solution 2:-

If you need to use a self-signed certificate for SSL/TLS connections in a production environment, you can add the certificate to the trusted certificates on your system. You can do this by following these steps:

Export the self-signed certificate from the server you're connecting to. You can usually do this by accessing the server's web interface and exporting the SSL certificate from your browser.

Copy the exported certificate to your local machine and save it as a ".crt" file.

Open a terminal window and navigate to the directory where you saved the certificate file.

Run the following command to add the certificate to the system's trusted certificates:

sudo cp <certificate-file>.crt /usr/local/share/ca-certificates/
sudo update-ca-certificates

This will copy the certificate file to the system's trusted certificates directory and update the system's certificate store.

Once the certificate is added to the system's trusted certificates, you should be able to connect to the server using SSL/TLS without encountering a "self signed certificate in certificate chain" error.

Note that the specific steps for adding a certificate to the trusted certificates may vary depending on your system and the server you're connecting to. Be sure to consult the documentation for your system and the server to ensure that you are following the correct procedure.