I summarized the method of enabling HTTPS using LetsEncrypt on AWS EC2.

Introduction

Many articles on enabling free HTTPS on EC2 in the world use Elastic Load Balancing, a service that costs about 2000 yen per month, or Amazon CloudFront, a pay-as-you-go service. However, I want to implement it using Let's Encrypt, a service that provides free SSL certificates, as written in the AWS documentation.

Prerequisites

1. Amazon Linux 2
2. Fixed IP with Elastic IP configured
3. Public access with http on custom domain completed
4. Running Apache with httpd

Related article Deploying PHP7.4 + Laravel6 project on AWS EC2

References

Official documentation

Implementation

Let's implement using the tool called Certbot.

Let's Encrypt issues SSL certificates with a validity period of three months.

Connect to the EC2 instance via ssh

In the directory where the private key .pem file is located, run:

$ ssh -i "*****.pem" ec2-user@12.345.678.910

Once inside the EC2, prepare with the following commands:

sudo wget -r --no-parent -A 'epel-release-*.rpm' http://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/7/x86_64/Packages/e/
sudo rpm -Uvh dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/epel/7/x86_64/Packages/e/epel-release-*.rpm
sudo yum-config-manager --enable epel*
sudo yum repolist all

The above commands install the EPEL repository package on the EC2.

The fourth command is to verify if repolist is installed.

Take a backup before editing the Apache configuration file

The Apache configuration file is located at:

/etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf

Make sure to take a backup before editing:

cd /etc/httpd/conf
sudo cp httpd.conf httpd_bak.text
ls

The cp command makes a copy of the file for backup. Confirm if the file has been copied with ls.

Edit the Apache configuration file

Edit the file using the vim command:

sudo vim httpd.conf

(Under Listen 80)

Add the following lines:

<VirtualHost *:80>
DocumentRoot "/var/www/html/<<Laravel_project_name>>/public"
ServerName "your_domain"
ServerAlias "www.your_domain"
</VirtualHost>

Remember to change DocumentRoot to the path of the Laravel project's public folder, and update ServerName and ServerAlias accordingly.

Restart Apache and check for errors

Restart Apache with the following command:

sudo systemctl restart httpd

If errors occur, revert to the original file:

// If error occurs, revert back.
sudo cp httpd_bak.text httpd.conf

You can overwrite the misconfigured file with the backup file.

Install Certbot

sudo yum install -y certbot python2-certbot-apache

Install the dependencies as well.

Start Certbot:

sudo certbot

Follow the prompts to complete the configuration.

Configure security group inbound rules

Finally, configure the security group settings.

Without these inbound settings, the page might not load even after entering the URL.

Add port 443 to the inbound rules.

Once these settings are completed, try accessing the URL to see if it displays properly.

Setup automatic renewal

The certificate you installed is valid for three months.

Set up automatic renewal after three months:

sudo vim /etc/crontab

Add the following line at the end:

39 1,13 * * * root certbot renew --no-self-upgrade

Restart the crond service to apply the changes:

sudo systemctl restart crond

With this, automatic renewal is configured.

According to AWS documentation, testing and further security enhancements are recommended after this setup. Be sure to check it out.

[Related article]

Deploying PHP7.4 + Laravel6 project on AWS EC2

Conclusion

That's it!

This process may be daunting for beginners, and mistakes can lead to errors, so taking backups before starting is always a good idea.