docs-v2/content/v2.0/security/https_setup.md

title	description	weight	menu	v2.0/tags
Enabling HTTPS with InfluxDB	Enable HTTPS and Transport Security Layer (TLS) secure communication between clients and your InfluxDB servers.	201	v2_0 name parent Enabling HTTPS Security & authorization	security authentication tls

Enabling HTTPS encrypts the communication between clients and the InfluxDB server. When configured with a signed certificate, HTTPS can also verify the authenticity of the InfluxDB server to connecting clients.

InfluxData strongly recommends enabling HTTPS, especially if you plan on sending requests to InfluxDB over a network.

Requirements

To enable HTTPS with InfluxDB, you'll need an existing or new InfluxDB instance and a Transport Layer Security (TLS) certificate (also known as a Secured Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate).

InfluxDB supports three types of TLS certificates:

• Single domain certificates signed by a Certificate Authority

  Single domain certificates provide cryptographic security to HTTPS requests and allow clients to verify the identity of the InfluxDB server. With this certificate option, every InfluxDB instance requires a unique single domain certificate.

• Wildcard certificates signed by a Certificate Authority

  Wildcard certificates provide cryptographic security to HTTPS requests and allow clients to verify the identity of the InfluxDB server. Wildcard certificates can be used across multiple InfluxDB instances on different servers.

• Self-signed certificates

  Self-signed certificates are not signed by a Certificate Authority (CA). Generate a self-signed certificate on your own machine. Unlike CA-signed certificates, self-signed certificates only provide cryptographic security to HTTPS requests. They do not allow clients to verify the identity of the InfluxDB server. With this certificate option, every InfluxDB instance requires a unique self-signed certificate.

The following two sections outline how to set up HTTPS with InfluxDB using a CA-signed certificate and using a self-signed certificate.

Set up HTTPS with a CA-signed certificate

1. Install the certificate

   Place the private key file (.key) and the signed certificate file (.crt) in the /etc/ssl/ directory.

2. Set certificate file permissions

   Users running InfluxDB must have read permissions on the TLS certificate.

   {{% note %}}You may opt to set up multiple users, groups, and permissions. Ultimately, make sure all users running InfluxDB have read permissions for the TLS certificate. {{% /note %}}

   Run the following command to give InfluxDB read and write permissions on the certificate files.

   sudo chmod 644 /etc/ssl/<CA-certificate-file>
   sudo chmod 600 /etc/ssl/<private-key-file>
   

3. Run influxd with TLS flags

   Start InfluxDB with TLS command line flags:

   influxd \
   --tls-cert "/etc/ssl/influxdb-selfsigned.crt"\
   --tls-key "/etc/ssl/influxdb-selfsigned.key"
   

4. Verify the HTTPS setup

   Verify that HTTPS is working by connecting to InfluxDB with the CLI tool:

   influx -ssl -host <domain_name>.com
   

   A successful connection returns the following:

   Connected to https://<domain_name>.com:8086 version 1.x.x
   InfluxDB shell version: 1.x.x
   >
   

That's it! You've successfully set up HTTPS with InfluxDB.

Set up HTTPS with a self-signed certificate

1. Generate a self-signed certificate

   The following command generates a private key file (.key) and a self-signed certificate file (.crt) which remain valid for the specified NUMBER_OF_DAYS. It outputs those files to /etc/ssl/ and gives them the required permissions.

   sudo openssl req -x509 -nodes -newkey rsa:2048 \
   -keyout /etc/ssl/influxdb-selfsigned.key \
   -out /etc/ssl/influxdb-selfsigned.crt \
   -days <NUMBER_OF_DAYS>
   

   When you execute the command, it will prompt you for more information. You can choose to fill out that information or leave it blank; both actions generate valid certificate files.

2. Run influxd with TLS flags

   Start InfluxDB with TLS command line flags:

   influxd \
   --tls-cert "/etc/ssl/influxdb-selfsigned.crt" \
   --tls-key "/etc/ssl/influxdb-selfsigned.key"
   

3. Verify the HTTPS setup

   Verify that HTTPS is working by connecting to InfluxDB with the CLI tool:

   influx -ssl -unsafeSsl -host <domain_name>.com
   

   A successful connection returns the following:

   Connected to https://<domain_name>.com:8086 version 1.x.x
   InfluxDB shell version: 1.x.x
   >
   

That's it! You've successfully set up HTTPS with InfluxDB.

Connect Telegraf to a secured InfluxDB instance

Connecting Telegraf to an InfluxDB instance that's using HTTPS requires some additional steps.

In the Telegraf configuration file (/etc/telegraf/telegraf.conf), edit the urls setting to indicate https instead of http. (Change localhost to the relevant domain name if necessary.) If you're using a self-signed certificate, uncomment the insecure_skip_verify setting and set it to true.

    ###############################################################################
    #                            OUTPUT PLUGINS                                   #
    ###############################################################################
>
    # Configuration for InfluxDB server to send metrics to
    [[outputs.influxdb]]
      ## The full HTTP or UDP endpoint URL for your InfluxDB instance.
      ## Multiple urls can be specified as part of the same cluster,
      ## this means that only ONE of the urls will be written to each interval.
      # urls = ["udp://localhost:8089"] # UDP endpoint example
      urls = ["https://<domain_name>.com:8086"]
>
    [...]
>
      ## Optional SSL Config
      [...]
      insecure_skip_verify = true # <-- Update only if you're using a self-signed certificate

Next, restart Telegraf and you're all set!