Can't Receive JSON Request Via HTTPS Due To Untrusted Certificate - iphone

Question

I have been googling this problem for hours now, and I can't seem to find a solution.
The last tutorial I followed was this tutorial explaining how I could send a JSON request over an untrusted SSL connection (in this case, a self-signed certificate).
In short, the code I have tried so far is this one:
This method checks if the token is valid with my web API:
-(BOOL)linked
{
if([self token] == nil)
{
return NO;
}else
{
NSURL *url = [NSURL URLWithString:[NSString stringWithFormat:#"%#?token=%#&object=User&action=check_authorized", SPAtajosApiLink, [self token], nil]];
NSMutableURLRequest *req = [NSMutableURLRequest requestWithURL:url];
[req setHTTPMethod:#"POST"];
NSLog(#"%#", req);
[req setHTTPBody: [mandatoryParameters dataUsingEncoding: NSUTF8StringEncoding]];
NSURLConnection *connection = [[NSURLConnection alloc] initWithRequest:req delegate:self];
[connection start];
NSDictionary *validity = [NSJSONSerialization
JSONObjectWithData:[NSURLConnection sendSynchronousRequest:req returningResponse:nil error:nil]
options:NSJSONReadingMutableContainers
error:nil];
NSLog(#"RESPONSE LINKED %# %#", validity[#"code"], validity[#"message"]);
}
return YES;
}
And I have implemented the NSURLConnectionDelegate methods as follows:
- (BOOL)connection:(NSURLConnection *)connection canAuthenticateAgainstProtectionSpace:(NSURLProtectionSpace *)protectionSpace
{
return [protectionSpace.authenticationMethod isEqualToString:NSURLAuthenticationMethodServerTrust];
}
- (void)connection:(NSURLConnection *)connection didReceiveAuthenticationChallenge:(NSURLAuthenticationChallenge *)challenge
{
if ([challenge.protectionSpace.authenticationMethod isEqualToString:NSURLAuthenticationMethodServerTrust])
{
NSLog(#"API LINK %#", challenge.protectionSpace.host);
if ([challenge.protectionSpace.host isEqualToString:SPAtajosApiLink])
{
[challenge.sender useCredential:[NSURLCredential credentialForTrust:challenge.protectionSpace.serverTrust] forAuthenticationChallenge:challenge];
}
}
[challenge.sender continueWithoutCredentialForAuthenticationChallenge:challenge];
}
Yet, my app always crashes with the following message:
2013-10-15 22:48:55.382 Atajos[733:60b] { URL:
https://MY_API_URL/www/?token=657fd6c02b3ba439e69b060f7f7680cc&object=User&action=check_authorized
} 2013-10-15 22:48:58.045 Atajos[733:3b17]
NSURLConnection/CFURLConnection HTTP load failed
(kCFStreamErrorDomainSSL, -9813) 2013-10-15 22:48:58.049
Atajos[733:60b] * Terminating app due to uncaught exception
'NSInvalidArgumentException', reason: 'data parameter is nil'
* First throw call stack: (0x2ec2de8b 0x38f286c7 0x2ec2ddcd 0x2f5b5d77 0x5df9d 0x62395 0x31433025 0x3141e631 0x313b8be7 0x313b7edd
0x3141dca1 0x3389976d 0x33899357 0x2ebf877f 0x2ebf871b 0x2ebf6ee7
0x2eb61541 0x2eb61323 0x3141cf43 0x314181e5 0x62191 0x39421ab7)
libc++abi.dylib: terminating with uncaught exception of type
NSException
Okay, so NSData, presumably the parameter in NSJSONSerialization is NULL. The question, why?
Bizarrely enough I have a similar code that actually works with a UIWebView interacting with a website over untrusted SSL:
- (BOOL)webView:(UIWebView *)webView shouldStartLoadWithRequest:(NSURLRequest *)request navigationType:(UIWebViewNavigationType)navigationType
{
//Need to rebuild base URL. Otherwise I get the parameters which will always fail the check.
NSURL *requestUrl = [request URL];
NSString *basicPathString = [NSString stringWithFormat:#"%#://%#:%#%#", requestUrl.scheme, requestUrl.host, requestUrl.port, requestUrl.path];
NSLog(#"%#", basicPathString);
if([basicPathString isEqualToString:SPAtajosLoginLink])
{
__block NSDictionary *jsonResponse = [NSJSONSerialization JSONObjectWithData:[NSData dataWithContentsOfURL:request.URL.absoluteURL]
options:NSJSONReadingMutableContainers
error:nil];
NSLog(#"Auth token is %#", jsonResponse[#"token"]);
[self dismissViewControllerAnimated:YES completion:^{
if([jsonResponse[#"code"] isEqualToNumber:[NSNumber numberWithInt:200]])
{
[[PDKeychainBindings sharedKeychainBindings] setObject:jsonResponse[#"token"]
forKey:#"com.shortcutpublicity.ios.atajos.userAccessToken"];
}else
{
UIAlertView *alertView = [[UIAlertView alloc] initWithTitle:NSLocalizedString(#"No Se Pudo Autenticar", #"Error 500 title")
message:NSLocalizedString(#"Se ha producido un error interno del servidor (500). Por favor, trata de nuevo más tarde.", #"Error describing error 500")
delegate:nil
cancelButtonTitle:NSLocalizedString(#"Aceptar", #"Accept") otherButtonTitles:nil];
[alertView show];
}
}];
}else {
//--------------THIS IS THE RELEVANT PART------------
BOOL result = _Authenticated;
if (!_Authenticated)
{
_FailedRequest = request;
NSURLConnection *trash = [[NSURLConnection alloc] initWithRequest:request delegate:self];
if(trash)
{
NSLog(#"Allocated succesfully.");
}
}
return result;
}
return YES;
}
-(void)connection:(NSURLConnection *)connection willSendRequestForAuthenticationChallenge:(NSURLAuthenticationChallenge *)challenge {
if ([challenge.protectionSpace.authenticationMethod isEqualToString:NSURLAuthenticationMethodServerTrust]) {
NSURL* baseURL = [NSURL URLWithString:SPatajosAuthLink];
if ([challenge.protectionSpace.host isEqualToString:baseURL.host]) {
NSLog(#"trusting connection to host %#", challenge.protectionSpace.host);
[challenge.sender useCredential:[NSURLCredential credentialForTrust:challenge.protectionSpace.serverTrust] forAuthenticationChallenge:challenge];
} else
NSLog(#"Not trusting connection to host %#", challenge.protectionSpace.host);
}
[challenge.sender continueWithoutCredentialForAuthenticationChallenge:challenge];
}
-(void)connection:(NSURLConnection *)connection didReceiveResponse:(NSURLResponse *)pResponse {
_Authenticated = YES;
[connection cancel];
[_webView loadRequest:_FailedRequest];
}
I have tried to adapt this code that works with a WebView but I haven't had any luck adapting to use it with a NSURLConnection.
To be honest, I'm not quite sure I know how these workarounds work. I have been stealing and attempting to adapt other people's code to no avail. I have looked at NSURLConnection and NSURLRequest docs and I wasn't able to solve these problems. Please help me out.

Answer 1

We use this category in an #ifedf block for testing... make sure you DO NOT leave this in production:
#ifdef DEBUG
#interface NSURLRequest (IgnoreSSL)
+(BOOL)allowsAnyHTTPSCertificateForHost:(NSString*)host;
#end
#implementation NSURLRequest (IgnoreSSL)
+(BOOL)allowsAnyHTTPSCertificateForHost:(NSString*)host {return YES;}
#end
#endif

Answer 2

try this Delegate method
- (void)connection:(NSURLConnection *)connection willSendRequestForAuthenticationChallenge:(NSURLAuthenticationChallenge *)challenge
{
// SecTrustRef trustRef = [[challenge protectionSpace] serverTrust];
// SecTrustEvaluate(trustRef, NULL);
//
// SecCertificateRef certRef = SecTrustGetCertificateAtIndex(trustRef, 0);
//
// NSData *certificateData = (__bridge NSData *) SecCertificateCopyData(certRef);
// NSLog(#"Subject: %#", [[NSString alloc] initWithData:certificateData encoding:NSUTF8StringEncoding]);
// [[challenge sender] continueWithoutCredentialForAuthenticationChallenge:challenge];
SecTrustRef trust = challenge.protectionSpace.serverTrust;
NSURLCredential *cred;
cred = [NSURLCredential credentialForTrust:trust];
[challenge.sender useCredential:cred forAuthenticationChallenge:challenge];
}