Hello,

here is the conversation with Robert I had so far about using
pound as an HTTPS / HTTPS proxy. He asked me for the reason(s) wanting
this MITM approach.

Robert Segall <[email protected]> (Do 09 Jul 2009 18:14:14 CEST):
> On Thu, 2009-07-09 at 10:22 +0200, Heiko Schlittermann wrote:
> > Hello Robert,
> > 
> > while using pound for a while we got a new request:
> > 
> >     HTTPS -> POUND -> HTTPS
> > 
> > The keys of the backend are installed on the POUND too. So POUND can
> > decrypt the request, check/sanitize it and then forward the request as
> > it normally does, but it should use HTTPS (for several reasons).
> > 
> > We can try to get this done by using an stunnel to the backend and let
> > then pound talk to the stunnel, but from my POV it would be much
> > cleaner if POUND could establish the backend connection as HTTPS.
> > 
> > Do you see any possibility to implement this? I can even try to
> > implement it by myself, so please tell me, if I'm totally wrong with
> > this idea or with our demand.
> 
> Personally I find this a poor idea (MITM-like), but we'll probably have
> to reconsider it for the next version. I am really curious about your
> reasons/use case...
> 
> Additional questions to the mailing list please.


The backend is an Microsoft-Webaccess (at least that's what the customer
told me). It's already set up as an HTTPS server and I don't want to
ask them for any change (their and my limited knowledge about what do
change in the MS system). I'm not sure about the application sending
self referencing URLs, not only as Redirects (these I could rewrite,
using Pound AFAIK), but sending links with self referencing full URLs.

This backend is protected by a Linux firewall. Just forwarding the HTTPS
port (traffic) to the backend is a poor solution, because they asked us
to limit the access to a specific URL pattern. So, my idea was the MITM
approach, I got the SSL key and cert and thought to use Pound to
decrcypt/check/sanitize the traffic and then connect via HTTPS to the
backend.

Probably squid is able to do this (needs to be compiled "--using-ssl")
and probably Apaches mod_proxy could be used. Both solutions are not
checked yet, since I like the lean approach of Pound, compared with
these two "fat" applications.

(The current setup we're testing uses an stunnel connection to the
backend...)

Any ideas and opinions are welcome.

    Best regards from Dresden/Germany
    Viele Grüße aus Dresden
    Heiko Schlittermann
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