Title: Missing Private Key
Last modified: September 1, 2016

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# Missing Private Key

 *  Resolved [andymartinuk](https://wordpress.org/support/users/andymartinuk/)
 * (@andymartinuk)
 * [9 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/)
 * When I select “Generate Certificate” I get an error; ‘Missing Private Key’
 * What are the steps to generate the Private Key?
 * [https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-encrypt/](https://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-encrypt/)

Viewing 9 replies - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)

 *  Plugin Author [Felix Arntz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/flixos90/)
 * (@flixos90)
 * [9 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/#post-7546722)
 * Hi Andy,
 * did you register an account successfully before? Did it show you a message like“
   Account registered.”?
 *  Thread Starter [andymartinuk](https://wordpress.org/support/users/andymartinuk/)
 * (@andymartinuk)
 * [9 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/#post-7546725)
 * Hi Felix,
 * Thanks for the quick reply. Yes, I saw an “Account Registered” message.
 * Andy.
 *  Plugin Author [Felix Arntz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/flixos90/)
 * (@flixos90)
 * [9 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/#post-7546726)
 * Could you have a look at the server filesystem to see if there’s a directory `../
   letsencrypt/live` (relative to your site’s root directory) and which subdirectories/
   files it contains? Sorry for the inconveniences, but I’ll need some more input
   to investigate. I’ll keep in mind to improve the error messages to be more accurate.
   🙂
 *  Thread Starter [andymartinuk](https://wordpress.org/support/users/andymartinuk/)
 * (@andymartinuk)
 * [9 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/#post-7546731)
 * Yes, that folder exists – I created manually 🙂
 * Here’s what I have….
 * letsencrypt/live
    letsencrypt/account/private.pem letsencrypt/account/pubic.pem
 * Permissions/ownership set as follows…
 * drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Jul 5 20:45 letsencrypt
    drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096
   Jul 5 20:45 live drwx—— 2 apache apache 4096 Jul 5 20:45 account -rw-r–r– 1 apache
   apache 3243 Jul 5 20:45 private.pem -rw-r–r– 1 apache apache 800 Jul 5 20:45 
   public.pem
 * letsencrypt folder is IN the SAME directory as my website root folder. Should
   it be INSIDE my website root folder (i.e. same level as wp-admin, wp-content 
   and wp-includes folders?
 * There is definitely a public and private key present in the “account folder”
 * Permissions issue? Folder in the wrong place? Need to change owner/group?
 *  Thread Starter [andymartinuk](https://wordpress.org/support/users/andymartinuk/)
 * (@andymartinuk)
 * [9 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/#post-7546732)
 * Here’s what I see: [https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23960006/missing_private_key_error.png](https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/23960006/missing_private_key_error.png)
 * Account is showing as registered, but I get the Missing Key error (top of screenshot)
   when selecting “Generate Certificate”.
 *  Plugin Author [Felix Arntz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/flixos90/)
 * (@flixos90)
 * [9 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/#post-7546734)
 * Regarding your question, that directory has to live one level above your actual
   WordPress site, so the way you have it looks right.
 * What’s unclear now to me is whether the plugin fails to read the account private
   key or whether it fails to create the domain private key. However, this being
   unclear is mostly to my plugin’s lack of accurate error messages.
 * If I can’t find the problem/fix during the next few days, I will release a quick
   update that enhances some of the underlying functionality, so that we can investigate
   this problem further.
 * Thank you for helping out with all the details, and thanks for your patience!
 *  Thread Starter [andymartinuk](https://wordpress.org/support/users/andymartinuk/)
 * (@andymartinuk)
 * [9 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/#post-7546738)
 * Thanks for your help Felix! 🙂 Speak soon…
 *  Plugin Author [Felix Arntz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/flixos90/)
 * (@flixos90)
 * [9 years, 11 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/#post-7546929)
 * Hi Andy,
 * I just drafted a new beta release, so I would ask you to please update and then
   try again. I could not detect the problem yet, but the improvements in error 
   handling might make it easier for me to find the cause.
 * Furthermore, there’s a new reset functionality – so you might wanna try do that
   as well to start over.
 *  Plugin Author [Felix Arntz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/flixos90/)
 * (@flixos90)
 * [9 years, 10 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/#post-7546992)
 * I’m considering this fixed for lack of response. Please reopen if necessary.

Viewing 9 replies - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)

The topic ‘Missing Private Key’ is closed to new replies.

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## Tags

 * [Let's Encrypt](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/lets-encrypt/)
 * [private key](https://wordpress.org/support/topic-tag/private-key/)

 * 9 replies
 * 2 participants
 * Last reply from: [Felix Arntz](https://wordpress.org/support/users/flixos90/)
 * Last activity: [9 years, 10 months ago](https://wordpress.org/support/topic/missing-private-key/#post-7546992)
 * Status: resolved