Apache HTTPS redirection certificate error - apache

Question

We have two domains (gis4business.co.uk and gis4business.com) that point to the same website hosted using apache. We are using SSL for the entire site and have a wildcard SSL certificate for *.gis4business.co.uk.
The default apache conf file (000-default.conf) has a single virtual host configured to redirect from http to https as follows:
<VirtualHost *:80>
...
Redirect permanent "/" "https://www.gis4business.co.uk/"
</VirtualHost>
Then we have a default SSL config file (default-ssl.conf) that has single a virtual host configured as follows:
<VirtualHost _default_:443>
ServerName gis4business.co.uk
ServerAlias *.gis4business.co.uk www.gis4business.co.uk *gis4business.com www.gis4business.com gis4business.com
...
SSLEngine on
SSLCertificateFile /etc/ssl/certs/certificate.crt
SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/ssl/private/privatekey.key
SSLCertificateChainFile /etc/ssl/certs/ca_certificate.crt
</VirtualHost>
This configuration is working as expected for the following urls:
http://www.gis4business.co.uk
http://www.gis4business.com
https://www.gis4business.co.uk
However, the url https://www.gis4business.com results in a certificate warning (SSL_ERROR_BAD_CERT_DOMAIN in firefox and ERR_CERT_COMMON_NAME_INVALID in chrome).
Its obviously complaining about the SSL certificate not matching the domain (gis4business.com), so I assume we need an HTTPS redirect from gis4business.com to gis4business.co.uk. We have experimented with various configurations and haven't managed to get a redirect working.
We have tried:
1) Adding another virtual host (*:443) to the top of the 000-default.conf file as follows:
<VirtualHost *:443>
ServerName gis4business.co.uk
ServerAlias *.gis4business.co.uk www.gis4business.co.uk *gis4business.com www.gis4business.com gis4business.com
Redirect permanent "/" "https://www.gis4business.co.uk/"
...
SSLEngine on
SSLCertificateFile /etc/ssl/certs/certificate.crt
SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/ssl/private/privatekey.key
SSLCertificateChainFile /etc/ssl/certs/ca_certificate.crt
</VirtualHost>
2) Adding another virtual host (default:443) to the top of the default-ssl.conf file as follows:
<VirtualHost _default_:443>
ServerName gis4business.co.uk
ServerAlias *.gis4business.co.uk www.gis4business.co.uk *gis4business.com www.gis4business.com gis4business.com
Redirect permanent "/" "https://www.gis4business.co.uk/"
...
SSLEngine on
SSLCertificateFile /etc/ssl/certs/certificate.crt
SSLCertificateKeyFile /etc/ssl/private/privatekey.key
SSLCertificateChainFile /etc/ssl/certs/ca_certificate.crt
</VirtualHost>
If redirection of https from one domain to another is possible without certificate errors, then what is the correct configuration to make it work?

Answer 1

Let's see how the redirect directive works
The Redirect directive maps an old URL into a new one by asking the client to refetch the resource at the new location.
The first request is processed by apache generating a 30x response to automatically redirect browser to the new URL
browser SERVER SSL cert
https://www.gis4business.com --> redirect *.gis4business.co.uk
302-redirect <--
https://www.gis4business.co.uk/ --> process *.gis4business.co.uk
The first request is served from https://www.gis4business.com using a certificate issued to *.gis4business.co.uk, so it is considered invalid consequently
To fix it you need to use a certificate issued to www.gis4business.com or *.gis4business.com. Define a new virtual host or request a new certificate with both hostnames.