Microsoft is a company that provides the best solutions to their customers. The Microsoft WSUS server is one of the most used solutions in the IT industry. It helps in updating Windows operating systems with the latest patches and software updates. It also helps in upgrading to new versions of Windows operating system.
The WSUS server uses SSL encryption to protect its communications from being intercepted by hackers or others who wish to access its data. This means that you need to install an SSL certificate on your WSUS server so that it can communicate with clients securely.
Using Ssl With Wsus
SSL should be enabled on the WSUS server. To enable SSL, open IIS Manager and double-click Server Certificates from the left pane. Select Create Domain Certificate and follow the wizard to create a self-signed certificate for your WSUS server.
You can then open Windows Update Services from Administrative Tools, select Options from the left pane, click Client Experience, and check Automatically Detect Settings. WSUS will automatically use SSL when communicating with clients and servers that support it.
To use SSL with WSUS, you must install an SSL certificate on the server and configure the client computers to trust that certificate.
The steps to do this are:
1. Install an SSL certificate on the computer running Windows Server Update Services (WSUS).
2. Configure client computers to trust the self-signed certificate installed by WSUS.
To install an SSL certificate on a computer running Windows Server Update Services (WSUS), complete these steps:
1. In Server Manager, click Tools, and then click Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager.
2. In Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager, in the left pane of the console tree, expand Sites > WSUS Administration Site (where <name> is the name of your WSUS server), and then double-click Server Certificates.
3. On the Action menu, click Create Self-Signed Certificate to create a certificate for use by WSUS.
If you are using WSUS to distribute updates, you will probably want to use SSL. The default port for WSUS is 8530 and the default SSL port is 8531. To enable SSL, simply use the following command:
WSUSUtil setServerCertificate(1)
Use SSL with WSUS
WSUS uses HTTPS to connect to Microsoft Update and to download updates. You can use SSL to encrypt the connection between your WSUS server and the Internet, or you can use SSL to encrypt traffic between WSUS servers in a hierarchy. To enable SSL encryption, you must obtain a certificate from a trusted certification authority (CA).
When using SSL for the WSUS database, SQL Server database connections are encrypted over SSL by default. When using SSL for update files, you should also enable encryption for file transfers on your client computers by setting Configure Client Download Notification (WUAUCLT) /n:1 /l:<location> in Group Policy. Without this setting, file transfers will not use HTTPS even if they are configured to do so on the server side.
When you install WSUS, the following ports are opened:
-TCP port 80 for HTTP connections (for clients)
-TCP port 443 for HTTPS connections (for clients)
-TCP port 8530 for WSUS administration (the default port)
-TCP port 8531 for WSUS synchronization (optional; if you use this port, you must open it on your firewall and inbound NAT router)
WSUS SSL Certificate Could Not Be Validated
To resolve this issue, verify that your WSUS server is configured to use SSL. To do this, open the Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager, expand the WSUS Web site and select the Server Certificates blade.
To resolve this issue, verify that your WSUS server is configured to use SSL. To do this, open the Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager, expand the WSUS Web site and select the Server Certificates blade.
Windows Server Update Services (WSUS) is a server role that you install on a computer running Windows Server 2008 or later. WSUS allows you to select updates from Microsoft and then distribute them to computers in your organization.
When you install and configure WSUS, you must use an SSL certificate that is issued by a trusted certification authority (CA). The CA is responsible for ensuring that the certificate is valid, has not been revoked, and does not contain any information or identifiers that could be used to violate your security policies.
The WSUS server uses the certificate to encrypt all communications with clients. This ensures that no one can read the data being sent between clients and servers.
If there are problems with your SSL certificate configuration, you will receive an error message when trying to synchronize updates from Microsoft: “SSL Certificate could not be validated” or “SSL Certificate validation failed”.
I have a WSUS server that is not working properly. It is running on Windows Server 2008 R2. I have setup the SSL certificate on the server and also on the client computers. I have confirmed that it is working correctly from a browser on a client machine. However, when I try to validate the SSL certificate using wsusutil from the command line, I get the following error:
wsusutil /Get-WsusServer /UseSSL:True
The WSUS server has been configured for secure communications over port 443 (HTTPS). However, the certificate could not be validated by an authorized certification authority. For more information about how to troubleshoot this problem, see http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929852.
If you are using WSUS as a client, it will try to connect to the server using HTTP. If you change the server configuration to use HTTPS, then you need to configure the client to use HTTPS as well.
If you are using IIS on the WSUS server, you need to make sure that SSL is configured correctly for the site.
On the WSUS server, open IIS Manager and select your WSUS website. Right-click on HTTP Redirect and choose Edit Feature Settings. Make sure that Redirect Requests To Port 80 is not checked. Then right-click on Default Document and choose Edit Feature Settings. Set Default Document Order To None so that there is no default document set in IIS which could cause issues with SSL/TLS connections.
Microsoft Update Services (WSUS) is a service that allows administrators to deploy the latest software updates for Microsoft products to computers in their organization. When you configure WSUS, you can specify whether client computers should automatically approve approved software updates.
If you set up WSUS in the default configuration, automatic approval is turned on by default. This means that when you approve an update, it will automatically be sent out to all clients without requiring them to manually approve the update first.
If you do not want your clients automatically approving approved updates, you can disable automatic approval by following these steps:
1) Open the WSUS console and navigate to Options > Automatic Approvals
2) Clear the Automatically approve updates that do not require user intervention check box.