HAproxy SSL/TLS Warning: Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default

Introduction

In this tutorial you will learn how to troubleshoot and fix an HAProxy Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default warning message using the methods described in the How to Troubleshoot Common HAProxy Errors tutorial at the beginning of this series. One you confirm that your server is generating the warning message, you will learn how to fix it by setting HAProxy’s ssl-dh-param-file configuration option to use a custom dhparams.pem file.

You may encounter an HAProxy Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default warning message when your HAProxy server is configured with an SSL/TLS certificate and the tune.ssl.default-dh-param parameter is not set in HAProxy’s haproxy.cfg configuration file. When the parameter is not set, HAProxy will default to a value of 1024 bits for the Diffie-Hellman key agreement portion of the TLS handshake, which is considered insecure.

Your HAProxy server may trigger this warning without you knowing about it. You can configure an SSL/TLS certificate and HAProxy will run, but the server may be warning you about the issue in the background. If you aren’t sure whether your HAProxy server is defaulting to a 1024 bit Diffie-Hellman parameter, you can use a tool like the SSL Labs Server Test to check for you. If you receive a report that has a line This server supports weak Diffie-Hellman (DH) key exchange parameters, then your HAProxy server is affected.

If you have already determined that your HAProxy server is generating a warning about the tune.ssl.default-dh-param setting and you would like to skip troubleshooting, the Resolving a Secure tune.ssl.default-dh-param Warning section at the end of this tutorial explains how to fix the issue.

Checking for a tune.ssl.default-dh-param Warning Using systemctl

Following the troubleshooting steps from the How to Troubleshoot Common HAProxy Errors tutorial at the beginning of this series, the first step when you are troubleshooting a Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default warning message is to check HAProxy’s status with systemctl.

The output from systemctl status may contain all the diagnostic information that you need to resolve the error. However, it is important to examine the current status of the haproxy service to ensure that it is running and that any services that rely on it are still able to function while you resolve the warning.

Use this systemctl command to examine HAProxy’s status on any Linux distribution:

sudo systemctl status haproxy.service -l --no-pager

The -l flag will ensure that systemctl outputs the entire contents of a line, instead of substituting in ellipses (…) for long lines. The --no-pager flag will output the entire log to your screen without invoking a tool like less that only shows a screen of content at a time.

Since you are troubleshooting a Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default warning message, you should receive output that is similar to the following:

Output
● haproxy.service - HAProxy Load Balancer
   Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/haproxy.service; disabled; vendor preset: disabled)
   Active: active (running) since Tue 2020-10-06 14:31:39 UTC; 2min 31s ago
  Process: 71406 ExecStartPre=/usr/sbin/haproxy -f $CONFIG -c -q (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
 Main PID: 71407 (haproxy)
. . .

Oct 06 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 systemd[1]: Starting HAProxy Load Balancer...
Oct 06 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 haproxy[71407]: [WARNING] 279/143139 (71407) : parsing [/etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg:69] : 'bind *:5000' :
Oct 06 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 haproxy[71407]:   unable to load default 1024 bits DH parameter for certificate '/etc/haproxy/fullchain.pem'.
Oct 06 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 haproxy[71407]:   , SSL library will use an automatically generated DH parameter.
Oct 06 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 haproxy[71407]: [WARNING] 279/143139 (71407) : Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default, if your workload permits it you should set it to at least 2048. Please set a value >= 1024 to make this warning disappear.
Oct 06 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 haproxy[71407]: Proxy main started.
Oct 06 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 haproxy[71407]: Proxy static started.
Oct 06 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 haproxy[71407]: Proxy app started.
Oct 06 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 systemd[1]: Started HAProxy Load Balancer.

There are two important highlighted sections to note in this output. The first is the active (running) line, which indicates that HAProxy is available and running. If your server shows a line like Active: failed, then you will need to troubleshoot HAProxy using the methods described in the How to Troubleshoot Common HAProxy Errors tutorial at the beginning of this series.

The second set of highlighted lines are from the systemd journal and contain the tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning. These lines give you all the information about the warning, how it is triggered, the steps taken by HAProxy, and how to resolve it.

If your systemctl output includes lines with the tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning, then skip to the Resolving a tune.ssl.default-dh-param Warning section at the end of this tutorial to learn how to configure HAProxy with a more secure value.

Otherwise if your systemctl output does not give specific information about the warning, but you know that your server is using weak Diffie-Hellman parameters, the next section of this tutorial will guide you through using journalctl logs to locate the warning message.

Checking for a tune.ssl.default-dh-param Warning Using journalctl

If your systemctl output does not include a tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning but you know that your server is affected, you should proceed with using the journalctl command to examine systemd logs for HAProxy.

Run the following command on any Linux distribution to inspect the systemd journal’s logs for the haproxy service:

sudo journalctl -u haproxy.service -l --no-pager | grep tune.ssl.default-dh-param

The | grep tune.ssl.default-dh-param portion of the command uses a pipe (|) to send the output from journalctl to the grep command as input. Using the pipe means that only matching lines from the journal will be shown on your screen.

If the journal includes a tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning, then you will receive output like the following:

Output
Oct 06 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 haproxy[71407]: [WARNING] 279/143139 (71407) : Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default, if your workload permits it you should set it to at least 2048. Please set a value >= 1024 to make this warning disappear.

Since this output includes the warning you can skip to the Setting a Secure tune.ssl.default-dh-param Value section at the end of this tutorial to learn how to configure HAProxy with a more secure value.

If you do not receive any output after running the journaltcl command, the next section will demonstrate how you can check for a tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning using HAProxy’s built-in configuration checking tool.

Checking for a tune.ssl.default-dh-param Warning Using haproxy -c or Log Files

HAProxy includes a command that can examine and validate its configuration files. You can use the command to check for syntax errors or invalid settings without restarting HAProxy and risking downtime for your services. Additionally, if your HAProxy server is configured to log output to a file or the system logs, you can examine the log files to check for a tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning.

To check for a tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning using HAProxy itself, run the following command on any Linux distribution. If your HAProxy configuration file is in a different location than the highlighted /etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg path, be sure to substitute in the correct path to your file:

sudo haproxy -c -f /etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg

If your server is configured with SSL/TLS and does not have a tune.ssl.default-dh-param set, then you will receive warning output similar to the following:

Output
[WARNING] 279/150829 (71512) : parsing [/etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg:69] : 'bind *:5000' :
  unable to load default 1024 bits DH parameter for certificate '/etc/haproxy/fullchain.pem'.
  , SSL library will use an automatically generated DH parameter.
[WARNING] 279/150829 (71512) : Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default, if your workload permits it you should set it to at least 2048. Please set a value >= 1024 to make this warning disappear.
Configuration file is valid

The highlighted line contains the tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning.

To check for the warning message using HAProxy’s logs, you can search for lines that match the tune.ssl.default-dh-param string using the grep command. Run the following command to check for warnings:

sudo grep tune.ssl.default-dh-param /var/log/haproxy.log

Note that if you have configured HAproxy with a different log location, be sure to substitute in your path in place of the highlighted /var/log/haproxy.log file.

If your server is generating the warning, then you will receive output like the following:

Output
Oct  6 14:31:39 bb9fb4c53743 haproxy[71407]: [WARNING] 279/143139 (71407) : Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default, if your workload permits it you should set it to at least 2048. Please set a value >= 1024 to make this warning disappear.

Now that you have determined whether your server is generating a tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning, you can proceed to the next step in this tutorial, which explains two methods that you can use to resolve the issue.

Resolving a tune.ssl.default-dh-param Warning

You can resolve a tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning in HAProxy with a few different settings. One option is to set the tune.ssl.default-dh-param value to something larger than 1024 explicitly in /etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg per the warning message. However, the HAProxy documentation recommends specifying custom Diffie-Hellman parameters since that approach is more secure, so we’ll use that method instead.

First you’ll generate a dhparams.pem file using the openssl utility. Once the file is created, you’ll add it to your global HAProxy configuration section so that any frontend blocks will inherit the setting.

To generate the custom DH parameters, run the following:

sudo openssl dhparam -out /etc/haproxy/dhparams.pem 2048

You will receive output like the following:

Output
Generating DH parameters, 2048 bit long safe prime, generator 2
This is going to take a long time
..............

Once the command completes, configure HAProxy to use the custom DH parameters file. Open /etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg in vi or your preferred editor.

sudo vi /etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg

Find the section in the file like the following:

Output
. . .
    # turn on stats unix socket
    stats socket /var/lib/haproxy/stats

    # utilize system-wide crypto-policies
    #ssl-default-bind-ciphers PROFILE=SYSTEM
    ssl-default-server-ciphers PROFILE=SYSTEM

Now add a line after the ssl-default-server-ciphers PROFILE=SYSTEM line like this:

ssl-dh-param-file /etc/haproxy/dhparams.pem

The entire section should resemble the following, including the new highlighted ssl-dh-param-file line that you added:

/etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg
. . .
    # turn on stats unix socket
    stats socket /var/lib/haproxy/stats

    # utilize system-wide crypto-policies
    #ssl-default-bind-ciphers PROFILE=SYSTEM
    ssl-default-server-ciphers PROFILE=SYSTEM
    ssl-dh-param-file /etc/haproxy/dhparams.pem

When you are done editing the file, save and close it by pressing ESC, typing :wq, and pressing ENTER.

Test the configuration using the haproxy -c command to ensure that you have added the correct setting and that HAProxy can access the custom dhparams.pem file:

sudo haproxy -c -f /etc/haproxy/haproxy.cfg

You should receive output stating that the configuration is valid like the following:

Output
Configuration file is valid

If your configuration is valid, restart HAProxy so that it uses the new Diffie-Hellman parameters file:

sudo systemctl restart haproxy.service

You have now configured HAProxy with a 2048 bit set of custom Diffie-Hellman parameters that all frontends will be able to use. You have also suppressed the tune.ssl.default-dh-param warnings.

Conclusion

In this tutorial, you learned how to troubleshoot an HAProxy Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default warning message. You explored four different methods to examine HAProxy’s configuration to find the message. First you used systemctl and journalctl to examine the status of the HAProxy server and try to find the message in the systemd logs. Then you examined the HAProxy configuration file using the built in haproxy -c configuration check. Finally you checked for log entries using the grep command on HAProxy’s log file.

After you confirmed that your server was generating a Setting tune.ssl.default-dh-param to 1024 by default warning message, you generated a custom Diffie-Hellman parameters file and configured HAProxy to use it by setting the ssl-dh-param-file configuration directive.

Now that you have that configuration in place, your HAProxy server will default to using the more secure Diffie-Hellman parameters, and the tune.ssl.default-dh-param warning message will no longer be in your logs.