3 ms·
There is one little-discussed down side to ever shorter-lived certificates...
by mcherm 6mo ago
There is one little-discussed down side to ever shorter-lived certificates...
- devrand 6mo agoIf you're using ACME to handle certificate rotation, can't you just configure multiple providers?
- pseudalopex 6mo agohttps://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48071607 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48071607
- Analemma_ 6mo agoOnly if you’re reissuing right before expiration, which is a stupid thing to do. If you have a 47-day cert, best practice is to reissue on day 30, meaning LE would need to be down for more than two weeks before anything went wrong. If this outage breaks your system, that’s entirely on you, not Let’s Encrypt.
- rconti 6mo agoYou're holding your 6-day cert wrong
- gbear605 6mo agoOnly as long as LE isn’t down for 17 days, then we’re in big trouble.
- eqvinox 6mo agoShort-lived = 6 days. Even if you reissue after 2 or 3 days, that's… not a lot of breathing room.
- bakies 6mo ago3-4 days is a ton of breathing room
- striking 6mo agoYou have to opt in, and they are honest about the tradeoffs when discussing them: > Short-lived certificates are opt-in and we have no plan to make them the default at this time. Subscribers that have fully automated their renewal process should be able to switch to short-lived certificates easily if they wish, but we understand that not everyone is in that position and generally comfortable with this significantly shorter lifetime. We hope that over time everyone moves to automated solutions and we can demonstrate that short-lived certificates work well. https://letsencrypt.org/2026/01/15/6day-and-ip-general-availability https://letsencrypt.org/2026/01/15/6day-and-ip-general-avail...
- eqvinox 6mo agoThat's not really an answer, especially with: > We hope that over time everyone moves to automated solutions and we can demonstrate that short-lived certificates work well. They're expressly trying to show that this is a viable approach. It's actually kinda good that this outage, whatever it is, is happening now, as it's giving them a chance to demonstrate (or not) that they can deliver.
- nottorp 6mo ago> no plan to make them the default at this time At this time! Boil the frog slowly...
- Dylan16807 6mo agoIs the frog the guy that still won't automate their certificates?
- jameshart 6mo agoUseful context: https://letsencrypt.org/2026/01/15/6day-and-ip-general-availability https://letsencrypt.org/2026/01/15/6day-and-ip-general-avail...
- deleted 6mo ago[deleted]
- dizhn 6mo agoLetsencrypt is not the only acme authority. ZeroSSL is the other popular one. There are others.
- pseudalopex 6mo agoZeroSSL offered for free 3 single name certificates. The next plan was $180 yearly. Actalis offered unlimited single name certificates. Why are ZeroSSL more popular? Google offered unlimited certificates with multiple names and wild cards. But they required a GCP account seemingly. It would require to give Google personal information, a phone number, and automatic payment permission. And Google not disable your account because your spouse uploaded images for your child's doctor. All others I saw charged for each certificate.
- dizhn 6mo agoIt's popular because Caddy uses it. I am not sure if it's default or just an option though.