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Secure Your AWS-Hosted Website with Let's Encrypt and Nginx

· 3 min read
Byju Luckose

Securing your web application is crucial in today's digital landscape, where data breaches and security threats are rampant. HTTPS has become the standard for secure communication over the internet, and thanks to Let's Encrypt, obtaining an SSL/TLS certificate to enable HTTPS on your website has never been easier or more affordable. This blog post will walk you through the process of securing your Nginx web server, hosted on Amazon Web Services (AWS), with a free SSL/TLS certificate from Let's Encrypt.

Prerequisites​

Before diving into the setup process, ensure you have the following:

  • An AWS account and a running EC2 instance where your web application is hosted.
  • Nginx installed on your EC2 instance.
  • A registered domain name pointing to your EC2 instance's public IP address.
  • SSH access to your EC2 instance.

Step 1: Set Up Certbot​

Certbot is an easy-to-use automatic client that fetches and deploys SSL/TLS certificates for your web server. To install Certbot and its Nginx plugin on your EC2 instance, connect to your instance via SSH and run:

bash
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install software-properties-common
sudo add-apt-repository universe
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:certbot/certbot
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install certbot python3-certbot-nginx

Note: The commands above are for Ubuntu/Debian systems. Adjust them accordingly if you're using another Linux distribution.

Step 2: Obtain and Install Let's Encrypt Certificate​

With Certbot installed, you can now obtain a Let's Encrypt certificate and configure Nginx to use it by running:

bash
sudo certbot --nginx -d yourdomain.com -d www.yourdomain.com

Replace yourdomain.com and www.yourdomain.com with your actual domain name. Certbot will modify your Nginx configuration automatically to use the obtained certificate and set up a secure HTTPS connection.

Step 3: Verify HTTPS Configuration​

After Certbot successfully obtains the certificate and configures Nginx, your website will be accessible via HTTPS. Verify this by accessing your website with https:// in front of your domain name. You should see a secure padlock icon next to the URL in your browser, indicating that the site is secure.

Step 4: Set Up Automatic Certificate Renewal​

Let's Encrypt certificates are valid for 90 days. Luckily, Certbot can automatically renew your certificates. To test the automatic renewal process, you can run:

bash
sudo certbot renew --dry-run

If everything is set up correctly, Certbot will renew your certificates automatically before they expire. You can also set up a cron job to periodically execute the renewal command.

Step 5: Configure Security Enhancements (Optional)​

For added security, consider implementing additional Nginx configurations such as HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS), Content Security Policy (CSP), and other headers to improve your website's security posture.

Conclusion​

By following these steps, you've successfully secured your AWS-hosted website with a free SSL/TLS certificate from Let's Encrypt, ensuring that your users' data is encrypted in transit. Implementing HTTPS not only boosts your website's security but also improves search engine ranking and user trust.

Secure web communication is an essential component of modern web development, and with tools like Let's Encrypt, Certbot, AWS, and Nginx, it's never been easier to implement. Continue to monitor your website's security and stay updated with the latest best practices to protect your users and your online presence.