Could not establish secure channel for SSL/TLS with authority '*'

Question

I must consume a PHP webservice which has a SSL certificate. My .net 3.5 Class library references the webservice with 'Add Service references' in Visualstudio 2010 (WCF right?).

When calling the main method of the webservice I receive;

Could not establish secure channel for SSL/TLS with authority '{base_url_of_WS}'.

I tried a lot, like

System.Net.ServicePointManager.ServerCertificateValidationCallback = new RemoteCertificateValidationCallback(CheckValidationResult); 
 public bool CheckValidationResult(Object sender, X509Certificate certificate, X509Chain chain, SslPolicyErrors sslPolicyErrors)
    {
        return true;
    }

But It wouldn't work. Also I have the certificate installed on my own machine.

*Extra info; When I use the wsdl location in 'Add service reference' the same error occurs. Before I tried it, I worked with a static wsdl.

Answer 1

Yes an Untrusted certificate can cause this. Look at the certificate path for the webservice by opening the websservice in a browser and use the browser tools to look at the certificate path. You may need to install one or more intermediate certificates onto the computer calling the webservice. In the browser you may see "Certificate errors" with an option to "Install Certificate" when you investigate further - this could be the certificate you missing.

My particular problem was a Geotrust Geotrust DV SSL CA intermediate certificate missing following an upgrade to their root server in July 2010 https://knowledge.geotrust.com/support/knowledge-base/index?page=content&id=AR1422

(2020 update deadlink preserved here: https://web.archive.org/web/20140724085537/https://knowledge.geotrust.com/support/knowledge-base/index?page=content&id=AR1422 )

Answer 2

This was exact the problem I was facing. At some other article I got a hint to change the configuration. For me this works:

<bindings>
  <basicHttpBinding>
    <binding name="xxxBinding">
      <security mode="Transport">
        <transport clientCredentialType="Certificate"/>
      </security>
    </binding>
  </basicHttpBinding>
</bindings>

Answer 3

Problem

I was running into the same error message while calling a third party API from my ASP.NET Core MVC project.

Could not establish secure channel for SSL/TLS with authority '{base_url_of_WS}'.

Solution

It turned out that the third party API's server required TLS 1.2. To resolve this issue, I added the following line of code to my controller's constructor:

System.Net.ServicePointManager.SecurityProtocol = System.Net.SecurityProtocolType.Tls12;

Answer 4

We had this issue on a new webserver from .aspx pages calling a webservice. We had not given permission to the app pool user to the machine certificate. The issue was fixed after we granted permission to the app pool user.

Answer 5

Ensure you run Visual Studio as an administrator.

Answer 6

In case it helps anyone else, using the new Microsoft Web Service Reference Provider tool, which is for .NET Standard and .NET Core, I had to add the following lines to the binding definition as below:

binding.Security.Mode = BasicHttpSecurityMode.Transport;
binding.Security.Transport = new HttpTransportSecurity{ClientCredentialType = HttpClientCredentialType.Certificate};

This is effectively the same as Micha's answer but in code as there is no config file.

So to incorporate the binding with the instantiation of the web service I did this:

 System.ServiceModel.BasicHttpBinding binding = new System.ServiceModel.BasicHttpBinding();
 binding.Security.Mode = System.ServiceModel.BasicHttpSecurityMode.Transport;
 binding.Security.Transport.ClientCredentialType = System.ServiceModel.HttpClientCredentialType.Certificate;
 var client = new WebServiceClient(binding, GetWebServiceEndpointAddress());

Where WebServiceClient is the proper name of your web service as you defined it.

Answer 7

This error can occur for lots of reasons, and the last time, I solved it by modifying the Reference.svcmap file, and changing how the WSDL file is referenced.

Throwing exception:

<MetadataSource Address="C:\Users\Me\Repo\Service.wsdl" Protocol="file" SourceId="1" />
<MetadataFile FileName="Service.wsdl" ... SourceUrl="file:///C:/Users/Me/Repo/Service.wsdl" />

Working fine:

<MetadataSource Address="https://server.domain/path/Service.wsdl" Protocol="http" SourceId="1" />
<MetadataFile FileName="Service.wsdl" ... SourceUrl="https://server.domain/path/Service.wsdl" />

This seems weird, but I have reproduced it. This was in a console application on .NET 4.5 and 4.7, as well as a .NET WebAPI site on 4.7.

Answer 8

Here is what fixed for me:

1) Make sure you are running Visual Studio as Administrator

2) Install and run winhttpcertcfg.exe to grant access

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa384088(v=vs.85).aspx

The command is similar to below: (enter your certificate subject and service name)

winhttpcertcfg -g -c LOCAL_MACHINE\MY -s "certificate subject" -a "NetworkService"
winhttpcertcfg -g -c LOCAL_MACHINE\MY -s "certificate subject" -a "LOCAL SERVICE"
winhttpcertcfg -g -c LOCAL_MACHINE\MY -s "certificate subject" -a "My Apps Service Account"

Answer 9

Had same error with code:

X509Certificate2 mycert = new X509Certificate2(@"C:\certificate.crt");

Solved by adding password:

X509Certificate2 mycert = new X509Certificate2(@"C:\certificate.crt", "password");