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# Ignore SSL Certificate Error with cURL
- URL: https://linuxhandbook.com/ignore-ssl-certificate-error-curl/
- Published: 2022-09-22T08:36:00.000Z
- Updated: 2022-11-06T08:37:10.000Z
- Description: Getting an expired certificate error while downloading files with curl? Here's how to ignore it.
- Author: Sagar Sharma
- Tags: Quick Tip
So you were trying to get an HTML response from a website using cURL and you got an SSL certificate error:
```
sagar@LHB:~$ curl https://expired.badssl.com
curl: (60) SSL certificate problem: certificate has expired
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.
```
It is because the [cURL](https://curl.se/?ref=linuxhandbook.com) by default will ensure connections using an SSL certificate and will throw an error if the website you specified is having misconfigured or expired certificate.
And this is going to be a quick tutorial on how you can ignore an SSL certificate error using cURL.
## How to ignore an SSL certificate error with cURL
While ignoring the error and still wishing for connecting to the faulty site is not recommended but if you trust the website, here you have it!
You can use the `--insecure` option while using curl and it will ignore the broken SSL certificate:
```
curl --insecure https://expired.badssl.com
```
```
sagar@LHB:~$ curl --insecure https://expired.badssl.com
expired.badssl.com
expired. badssl.com
```
Similarly, you can also use `-k` option to have the same effect being the short form of `--insecure` option:
```
curl -k https://expired.badssl.com
```
```
sagar@LHB:~$ curl -k https://expired.badssl.com
expired.badssl.com
expired. badssl.com
```
### Apply the --insecure option to every SSL connection
⚠️
This is not suggested unless you are performing this under isolation or a testing environment.
You can append `insecure` to the curl-config file using the given command:
```
echo "insecure" >> ~/.curlrc
```
And now, you can [get HTML response with curl](https://linuxhandbook.com/curl-command-examples/) without using the `--insecure` option:
```
sagar@LHB:~$ curl https://expired.badssl.com
expired.badssl.com
expired. badssl.com
```
## Wrapping Up
This was my take on how you can ignore an SSL certificate while using curl. I hope this solves the issue.
And if not, make sure to leave a comment and I will try my best to come up with a solution.