Invalid Certificate RBR50

[lnjustin]

I’m getting invalid certificate errors in every browser. The Orbi router login address is the culprit. I wasn’t able to access the internet at all. After a few searches on the forum, I discovered that disabling the Circle on Netgear Orbi gives me internet access back, since web requests aren’t having to go to that address anymore. But how do I fix the underlying invalid certificate issue so I can re-enable Circle?

[CrimpOn]

---

@lnjustin wrote:
I’m getting invalid certificate errors in every browser. The Orbi router login address is the culprit. I wasn’t able to access the internet at all. After a few searches on the forum, I discovered that disabling the Circle on Netgear Orbi gives me internet access back, since web requests aren’t having to go to that address anymore. But how do I fix the underlying invalid certificate issue so I can re-enable Circle?

---

The Orbi SSL Certificate is self-signed (by Netgear), not issued by a recognized certificate authority.  In August of 2019, the URL's that Netgear had certificates for (router.com, orbilogin.com, orbilogin.net, and several others) expired.  Either Netgear failed to renew them, or someone figured out that thousands of devices not owned by or run by Netgear had no business claiming to be Netgear.  Netgear has never explained what happened.

Modern browsers baulk at web sites having no SSL certificate, and most modern browsers automatically look for an https connection before falling back to an http connection.  Netgear had a choice: (a) have no certificate, which means that browsers will scream out "INSECURE", or (b) have a self-signed certificate which will also prompt a warning from browsers.

The solution I have used is to find that option in tiny type that says "Go to the web site anyway."  After this is done once, the browser will remember and stop throwing up the warning.

[lnjustin]

But why has this been working for months without issue and all of a sudden becomes an issue on all of my devices?

[CrimpOn]

When was Circle enabled?

[lnjustin]

Months ago. Haven’t had a problem at all until now.

[CrimpOn]

or, perhaps, when did Circle encounter a web URL that prompted it to redirect a connection to the Orbi web interface?

Having never enabled any version of Parental Controls (the one with Open DNS, Circle, or the "new" Smart Parental Controls), I have no idea.

Does the tactic of saying "go ahead" not work?  (If it doesn't, then I need to stop recommending people do that.)

Was there any clue on the screen about which URL triggered the issue?

[lnjustin]

I wasn’t given that option to just go ahead. Plus, it has impacted every single device. Streaming from Apple TV (which doesn’t even have a browser), IoT devices, everything, so doing that for one browser wont get me very far.