Setting up TLS with certificates Fastly manages

This guide describes how to use Fastly TLS to enable HTTPS for a domain using a certificate managed by Fastly. To serve secure traffic from Fastly using HTTPS, a website or application needs to provide clients with a valid TLS certificate signed by a trusted certification authority. TLS (Transport Level Security) and its predecessor SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) are the protocols that allow clients to form secure server connections so traffic can be served over HTTPS.

Fastly-managed certificates use the ACME protocol to procure and renew TLS certificates. You have several options for certification authorities:

• Certainly, Fastly's publicly-trusted certification authority
• Let’s Encrypt, a third-party non-profit certification authority
• GlobalSign, a third-party commercial certification authority (only available for paid accounts)

Trial accounts include Fastly-managed certificates for two domains using the Certainly or Let's Encrypt certification authority. Upgrade to a paid account to use GlobalSign or secure additional domains.

Before you begin

Before setting up TLS on your domains, be sure to review the Fastly TLS prerequisites and limitations.

Setting up TLS for a domain

Setting up TLS for a domain requires you to secure the domain by registering it with a certification authority. To start this process through the Fastly control panel (instead of programmatically) follow these steps.

Verifying domain ownership

To begin serving HTTPS traffic, Fastly needs to verify that you control any domain you’ve added to the control panel. Fastly allows you to verify apex domains and subdomains via the ACME DNS challenge, the ACME HTTP challenge, or via email validation. Each requires you to make specific DNS changes. Wildcard domains require the DNS challenge or email validation challenge type.

What happens next

It should take no more than an hour for the TLS enablement process to progress through all of the TLS statuses shown below:

Troubleshooting

If more than an hour has passed and TLS enablement appears to be stalled in one of the stages of adding a domain, there is likely an issue.

Domains stuck in the Checking domain DNS records state

If the domain is stuck in the Checking domain DNS records state, it is likely that you have not configured your DNS records correctly in order to verify domain ownership. You can check the DNS records yourself using a dig command in a command line application as follows:

Be sure to replace example.com with the hostname you used when you configured your DNS records.

If you have correctly configured your DNS records, the result from this command will include one of the CNAME or A Records required for verification as defined in the Verifying domain ownership instructions.

If you recently added or modified DNS records, you may need to wait up to 72 hours for your DNS changes to propagate across the internet. If you don’t see these addresses within that time period, you may have misconfigured your DNS records.

If you are still having issues, there may be a Certification Authority Authorization (CAA) record on your domain that is blocking the certification authority from issuing certificates. This CAA record is used to specify which certification authorities (CAs) are allowed to issue certificates for a domain. If a CAA record exists, you may need to correct or remove this record in order to use a managed Fastly TLS certificate.

The following lists the CAA record value needed for each certification authority supported by Fastly TLS:

Domains stuck in the Certificate requested state

If the domain is stuck in the Waiting for a response from CA state, this is likely a temporary issue with the certification authority. Be sure to allow up to an hour in this state before contacting support for assistance. If this is a new certificate request, you can also try deleting the domain and starting again.

TLS activated but certificate not deployed everywhere

If the domain displays the Activated state but the certificate doesn’t appear to be available everywhere, the certificate is likely still in the process of being deployed throughout the Fastly network. It can take anywhere from 20 minutes to an hour for certificates to fully deploy. Be sure to allow up to an hour in this state before contacting support for assistance.

Subscriptions listed as failed

A subscription displays the Failed state if it is a new subscription and fails to issue a certificate for seven days or an existing subscription that fails to renew a certificate for seven days beyond its expiration date. You will also receive an email notification about failed subscriptions.

Subscriptions typically fail if you are not pointing traffic to Fastly or if you don't have proper DNS records in place. GlobalSign subscriptions specifically may fail if the domain hasn't resolved globally, meaning it's not accessible from anywhere in the world. Use a tool like DNS Checker to ensure your domain is propagated globally.

Once you resolve these issues, you can try to re-issue the subscription using the steps below:

1. Log in to the Fastly control panel.
2. Go to Security > TLS management > Subscriptions.
3. Click View subscription details for the failed subscription.
4. Click Retry now.

After you retry a failed subscription, we will try to issue or renew the associated certificate for a 24-hour period. If we still cannot obtain a certificate after 24 hours, the subscription will again be marked as failed.

Pointing DNS to serve HTTPS traffic

To serve secure traffic via HTTPS once the certificate is deployed, follow these steps.

1. Ensure that the domains you've added via the TLS domains interface have been added to a properly configured Fastly service.

2. Configure your DNS records to point traffic at the newly created certificate’s IP addresses. If you used the HTTP challenge method to verify domain ownership, you’re already pointing traffic at the certificate. All DNS details (CNAME, A records, and optionally AAAA records) can be found by clicking See DNS details to view the TLS configuration associated with the domain.

   For an apex domain (e.g., example.com), you'll need to create an A record with your DNS provider. For subdomains and wildcard domains (e.g, www.example.com or *.example.com), you'll need to create a relevant CNAME record.

Your domains and certificates can be set to use one or more TLS configurations. For more information, refer to the details on managing DNS and TLS configurations.

Managing TLS subscriptions

You can use the Subscriptions page to manage your TLS subscriptions and take actions such as:

• adding or removing domains
• changing the domain common name
• migrating to Certainly, Fastly's certification authority
• deactivating TLS

Managing domains on TLS subscriptions

To manage the domains on your TLS subscriptions, such as to add or remove domains or to change the domain common name, follow these steps:

1. Log in to the Fastly control panel.

2. Go to Security > TLS management > Subscriptions.

3. Click View subscription details for the subscription you want to make changes to.

   

4. Click Manage Subscription.

   NOTE

   You can only manage a subscription in Pending, Issued, and Renewing states.

5. From the Manage Subscription details page, you can do the following:

   

   • Add new domains: In the Domain field, enter one or more apex domains (e.g., example.com), subdomains (e.g., www.example.com or api.example.com), or a wildcard domain (e.g., *.example.com) and click Add. Separate multiple domains with a comma.
   • Remove existing domains: Click the trash in the Actions column on the same line as the domain you want to delete. Follow the instructions in the confirmation window to complete the deletion.
   • Change the subscription common name: From the Common name menu, select the domain used to represent this subscription.

6. After making any changes to the subscription, click Submit. A message appears asking to confirm your changes.

7. Click Confirm changes to submit your changes. To return to the previous screen, click No, review changes.

Migrating to Certainly

If you're using the Let’s Encrypt or GlobalSign certification authorities to secure your domains, you can use the Fastly control panel to migrate to Certainly, Fastly's publicly-trusted certification authority.

To migrate to Certainly:

1. Log in to the Fastly control panel.

2. Go to Security > TLS management > Subscriptions.

3. Click View subscription details for the subscription you want to make changes to.

4. Click Migrate to Certainly.

   

5. Confirm that you want to migrate your certificate, then click Migrate to Certainly.

After clicking migrate, Fastly will automatically replace your certificate with a Certainly certificate and verify domain ownership without any downtime. Fastly will continue to serve your existing certificate until it is replaced by Certainly. If there were changes to your DNS records that prohibit Certainly from validating your domain and Fastly can't automatically verify the ownership, a notice will appear with instructions you'll need to make to your DNS details.

Deactivating TLS and deleting a TLS domain

Once a domain has TLS activated, you have the option to deactivate TLS via the Deactivate TLS button listed on each domain card on the TLS domains page. If a domain has multiple certificates, you can elect to deactivate a specific certificate by clicking Add/Edit Activations and clicking the Deactivate button next to any active configurations. If all certificates are deactivated, Fastly will no longer serve TLS traffic on the selected domain and it will become disabled. Fastly will attempt to renew a certificate for a disabled domain. To prevent this renewal process, delete the associated subscription after you disable it. Fastly will not renew certificates for deleted subscriptions.

Certificate management and renewals

Each certification authority has a separate verification and renewal time frame that Fastly follows when managing your certificates:

• Certainly renewals. Certainly issues certificates that are valid for 30 days. Fastly will attempt to re-verify your domain and renew your certificate after 20 days. However, if your DNS records no longer point at Fastly or if a CAA record blocks Certainly, the certificate will lapse at the end of the 30-day period.

• Let's Encrypt renewals. Let’s Encrypt issues certificates that are valid for 90 days. Fastly will attempt to re-verify your domain and renew your certificate after 60 days. However, if DNS records no longer point at Fastly or if a CAA record blocks Let's Encrypt, the certificate will lapse at the end of the 90-day period.

• GlobalSign renewals. GlobalSign issues certificates that are valid for 365 days. Fastly will attempt to re-verify your domain and renew your certificate after 275 days. However, if DNS records no longer point at Fastly, or if a CAA record blocks GlobalSign, the certificate will lapse at the end of the 365-day period. Certificates provided by GlobalSign are subject to the terms of GlobalSign's Subscriber Agreement, which can be found at https://www.globalsign.com/repository.

Fastly automatically runs a DNS check for certificate renewals within the following timeframes:

• Certainly: 10 days before certificates are due to expire
• Let's Encrypt: 30 days before certificates are due to expire
• GlobalSign: 90 to 120 days before certificates are due to expire

If a DNS check indicates that a renewal is failing, Fastly will automatically email all account users with TLS management permissions, notifying them of the upcoming expiration. If the renewal continues to fail, Fastly will continue to email users on the account on a schedule up until the expiry date.

In addition, you must verify domain ownership as part of the management process. If you have the correct DNS records for verifying domain ownership and there is no blocking CAA record, but you are still receiving renewal failure emails, contact support for assistance.