title: Fixing 403 error on SaltStack Config 8.6 integrated with vRA and vIDM
---
I've been wanting to learn a bit more about [SaltStack Config](https://www.vmware.com/products/vrealize-automation/saltstack-config.html) so I recently deployed SSC 8.6 to my environment (using vRealize Suite Lifecycle Manager to do so as [described here](https://cosmin.gq/2021/02/02/deploying-saltstack-config-via-lifecycle-manager-in-a-vra-environment/)). I selected the option to integrate with my pre-existing vRA and vIDM instances so that I wouldn't have to manage authentication directly since I recall that the LDAP authentication piece was a little clumsy the last time I tried it.
### The Problem
Unfortunately I ran into a problem immediately after the deployment completed:
Instead of being redirected to the vIDM authentication screen, I get a 403 Forbidden error.
I used SSH to log in to the SSC appliance as `root`, and I found this in the `/var/log/raas/raas` log file:
```
2021-11-05 18:37:47,705 [var.lib.raas.unpack._MEIV8zDs3.raas.mods.vra.params ][ERROR :252 ][Webserver:6170] SSL Exception - https://vra.lab.bowdre.net/csp/gateway/am/api/auth/discovery may be using a self-signed certificate HTTPSConnectionPool(host='vra.lab.bowdre.net', port=443): Max retries exceeded with url: /csp/gateway/am/api/auth/discovery?username=service_type&state=aHR0cHM6Ly9zc2MubGFiLmJvd2RyZS5uZXQvaWRlbnRpdHkvYXBpL2NvcmUvYXV0aG4vY3Nw&redirect_uri=https%3A%2F%2Fssc.lab.bowdre.net%2Fidentity%2Fapi%2Fcore%2Fauthn%2Fcsp&client_id=ssc-299XZv71So (Caused by SSLError(SSLCertVerificationError(1, '[SSL: CERTIFICATE_VERIFY_FAILED] certificate verify failed: self signed certificate in certificate chain (_ssl.c:1076)')))
2021-11-05 18:37:47,928 [tornado.application ][ERROR :1792][Webserver:6170] Uncaught exception GET /csp/gateway/am/api/loggedin/user/profile (192.168.1.100)
curl: (60) SSL certificate problem: self signed certificate in certificate chain
More details here: https://curl.se/docs/sslcerts.html
curl failed to verify the legitimacy of the server and therefore could not
establish a secure connection to it. To learn more about this situation and
how to fix it, please visit the web page mentioned above.
```
In my homelab, I am indeed using self-signed certificates. I also encountered the same issue in my lab at work, though, and I'm using certs issued by our enterprise CA there. I had run into a similar problem with previous versions of SSC, but the [quick-and-dirty workaround to disable certificate verification](https://communities.vmware.com/t5/VMware-vRealize-Discussions/SaltStack-Config-Integration-show-Blank-Page/td-p/2863973) doesn't seem to work anymore.
### The Solution
Clearly I needed to import either the vRA system's certificate (for my homelab) or the certificate chain for my enterprise CA (for my work environment) into SSC's certificate store so that it will trust vRA. But how?
I fumbled around for a bit and managed to get the required certs added to the system certificate store so that my `curl` test would succeed, but trying to access the SSC web UI still gave me a big middle finger. I eventually found [this documentation](https://docs.vmware.com/en/VMware-vRealize-Automation-SaltStack-Config/8.6/install-configure-saltstack-config/GUID-21A87CE2-8184-4F41-B71B-0FCBB93F21FC.html#troubleshooting-saltstack-config-environments-with-vrealize-automation-that-use-selfsigned-certificates-3) which describes how to configure SSC to work with self-signed certs, and it held the missing detail of how to tell the SaltStack Returner-as-a-Service (RaaS) component that it should use that system certificate store.
So here's what I did to get things working in my homelab:
1. Point a browser to my vRA instance, click on the certificate error to view the certificate details, and then export the _CA_ certificate to a local file. (For a self-signed cert issued by LCM, this will likely be called something like `Automatically generated one-off CA authority for vRA`.)
