How can I force users to access my page over HTTPS

Question

I've got just one page that I want to force to be accessed as an HTTPS page (PHP on Apache). How do I do this without making the whole directory require HTTPS? Or, if you submit a form to an HTTPS page from an HTTP page, does it send it by HTTPS instead of HTTP?

Here is my example:

http://www.example.com/some-page.php

I want it to only be accessed through:

https://www.example.com/some-page.php

Sure, I can put all of the links to this page pointed at the HTTPS version, but that doesn't stop some fool from accessing it through HTTP on purpose...

One thing I thought was putting a redirect in the header of the PHP file to check to be sure that they are accessing the HTTPS version:

if($_SERVER["SCRIPT_URI"] == "http://www.example.com/some-page.php"){
  header('Location: https://www.example.com/some-page.php');
}

But that can't be the right way, can it?

BTW, please pay no attention to the URL. I know that if it were actually a page where there was a shopping cart, etc., you would do it a different way. Think of it as a page from a site that sells one item for one price where you type in your credit card info to be submitted to a payment gateway on an external site for the express purpose of charging your card one time.

Answer 1

Use $_SERVER['HTTPS'] to tell if it is SSL, and redirect to the right place if not.

And remember, the page that displays the form does not need to be fed via HTTPS, it's the post back URL that needs it most.

Edit: yes, as is pointed out below, it's best to have the entire process in HTTPS. It's much more reassuring - I was pointing out that the post is the most critical part. Also, you need to take care that any cookies are set to be secure, so they will only be sent via SSL. The mod_rewrite solution is also very nifty, I've used it to secure a lot of applications on my own website.

Answer 2

If you use Apache or something like LiteSpeed, which supports .htaccess files, you can do the following. If you don't already have a .htaccess file, you should create a new .htaccess file in your root directory (usually where your index.php is located). Now add these lines as the first rewrite rules in your .htaccess:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} off
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI} [L,R=301]

You only need the instruction "RewriteEngine On" once in your .htaccess for all rewrite rules, so if you already have it, just copy the second and third line.

I hope this helps.

Answer 3

I have used this script and it works well through the site.

if(empty($_SERVER['HTTPS']) || $_SERVER['HTTPS'] == "off"){
    $redirect = 'https://' . $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'] . $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'];
    enter code hereheader('HTTP/1.1 301 Moved Permanently');
    header('Location: ' . $redirect);
    exit();
}

Answer 4

Had to do something like this when running behind a load balancer. Hat tip https://stackoverflow.com/a/16076965/766172

function isSecure() {
    return (
        (!empty($_SERVER['HTTPS']) && $_SERVER['HTTPS'] !== 'off')
     || $_SERVER['SERVER_PORT'] == 443
     || (
            (!empty($_SERVER['HTTP_X_FORWARDED_PROTO']) && $_SERVER['HTTP_X_FORWARDED_PROTO'] == 'https')
         || (!empty($_SERVER['HTTP_X_FORWARDED_SSL'])   && $_SERVER['HTTP_X_FORWARDED_SSL'] == 'on')
        )
    );
}

function requireHTTPS() {
    if (!isSecure()) {
        header('Location: https://' . $_SERVER['HTTP_HOST'] . $_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'], TRUE, 301);
        exit;
    }
}

Answer 5

You could do it with a directive and mod_rewrite on Apache:

<Location /buyCrap.php>
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTPS} off
RewriteRule (.*) https://%{HTTP_HOST}%{REQUEST_URI}
</Location>

You could make the Location smarter over time using regular expressions if you want.

Answer 6

// Force HTTPS for security
if($_SERVER["HTTPS"] != "on") {
    $pageURL = "Location: https://";
    if ($_SERVER["SERVER_PORT"] != "80") {
        $pageURL .= $_SERVER["SERVER_NAME"] . ":" . $_SERVER["SERVER_PORT"] . $_SERVER["REQUEST_URI"];
    } else {
        $pageURL .= $_SERVER["SERVER_NAME"] . $_SERVER["REQUEST_URI"];
    }
    header($pageURL);
}