Error: SSL_connect returned=1 errno=0 state=SSLv3 read server hello A: sslv3 alert handshake failure

Question

I tried to login to heroku using the toolbelt and I got this error.

Error: SSL_connect returned=1 errno=0 state=SSLv3 read server hello A: sslv3 alert handshake failure (OpenSSL::SSL::SSLError) (Excon::Errors::SocketError)

I'm using Windows and I have cacert.prm defined as a variable as I have "SSL_CERT_FILE=C:\mowes\cacert.pem" in my PATH environment variable.

How can this be fixed?

Answer 1

SSLv3 read server hello A: sslv3 alert handshake failure

This has nothing to do with the certificate and thus the setting for the certificate path is irrelevant for this error. The server might not like the protocol version you use or the ciphers you offer or that the server requires the SNI extension but your client does not use it. It might also be a firewall in between or it might be that you access a service which is not available with SSL/TLS at all.

Please try the URL with a browser or curl and see if you get the same errors. If you get instead success with these clients make sure you are using the same host as with your PHP problem, same proxy (if any) and if everything is the same make a packet capture and compare the SSL handshake ClientHello from the successful and from the failed connect.