Issue #9003: http.client.HTTPSConnection, urllib.request.HTTPSHandler and

urllib.request.urlopen now take optional arguments to allow for
server certificate checking, as recommended in public uses of HTTPS.

Doc/library/http.client.rst

@@ -50,19 +50,31 @@ The module provides the following classes:
       *source_address* was added.
 
 
-.. class:: HTTPSConnection(host, port=None, key_file=None, cert_file=None, strict=None[, timeout[, source_address]])
+.. class:: HTTPSConnection(host, port=None, key_file=None, cert_file=None, strict=None[, timeout[, source_address]], *, context=None, check_hostname=None)
 
    A subclass of :class:`HTTPConnection` that uses SSL for communication with
-   secure servers.  Default port is ``443``.  *key_file* is the name of a PEM
-   formatted file that contains your private key, and *cert_file* is a PEM
-   formatted certificate chain file; both can be used for authenticating
-   yourself against the server.
+   secure servers.  Default port is ``443``.  If *context* is specified, it
+   must be a :class:`ssl.SSLContext` instance describing the various SSL
+   options.  If *context* is specified and has a :attr:`~ssl.SSLContext.verify_mode`
+   of either :data:`~ssl.CERT_OPTIONAL` or :data:`~ssl.CERT_REQUIRED`, then
+   by default *host* is matched against the host name(s) allowed by the
+   server's certificate.  If you want to change that behaviour, you can
+   explicitly set *check_hostname* to False.
 
-   .. warning::
-      This does not do any verification of the server's certificate.
+   *key_file* and *cert_file* are deprecated, please use
+   :meth:`ssl.SSLContext.load_cert_chain` instead.
+
+   If you access arbitrary hosts on the Internet, it is recommended to
+   require certificate checking and feed the *context* with a set of
+   trusted CA certificates::
+
+      context = ssl.SSLContext(ssl.PROTOCOL_TLSv1)
+      context.verify_mode = ssl.CERT_REQUIRED
+      context.load_verify_locations('/etc/pki/tls/certs/ca-bundle.crt')
+      h = client.HTTPSConnection('svn.python.org', 443, context=context)
 
    .. versionchanged:: 3.2
-      *source_address* was added.
+      *source_address*, *context* and *check_hostname* were added.
 
 
 .. class:: HTTPResponse(sock, debuglevel=0, strict=0, method=None, url=None)

Doc/library/urllib.request.rst

@@ -15,14 +15,11 @@ authentication, redirections, cookies and more.
 The :mod:`urllib.request` module defines the following functions:
 
 
-.. function:: urlopen(url, data=None[, timeout])
+.. function:: urlopen(url, data=None[, timeout], *, cafile=None, capath=None)
 
    Open the URL *url*, which can be either a string or a
    :class:`Request` object.
 
-   .. warning::
-      HTTPS requests do not do any verification of the server's certificate.
-
    *data* may be a string specifying additional data to send to the
    server, or ``None`` if no such data is needed.  Currently HTTP
    requests are the only ones that use *data*; the HTTP request will
@@ -38,6 +35,16 @@ The :mod:`urllib.request` module defines the following functions:
    the global default timeout setting will be used).  This actually
    only works for HTTP, HTTPS and FTP connections.
 
+   The optional *cafile* and *capath* parameters specify a set of trusted
+   CA certificates for HTTPS requests.  *cafile* should point to a single
+   file containing a bundle of CA certificates, whereas *capath* should
+   point to a directory of hashed certificate files.  More information can
+   be found in :meth:`ssl.SSLContext.load_verify_locations`.
+
+   .. warning::
+      If neither *cafile* nor *capath* is specified, an HTTPS request
+      will not do any verification of the server's certificate.
+
    This function returns a file-like object with two additional methods from
    the :mod:`urllib.response` module
 
@@ -62,6 +69,9 @@ The :mod:`urllib.request` module defines the following functions:
    Proxy handling, which was done by passing a dictionary parameter to
    ``urllib.urlopen``, can be obtained by using :class:`ProxyHandler` objects.
 
+   .. versionchanged:: 3.2
+      *cafile* and *capath* were added.
+
 .. function:: install_opener(opener)
 
    Install an :class:`OpenerDirector` instance as the default global opener.
@@ -421,9 +431,13 @@ The following classes are provided:
    A class to handle opening of HTTP URLs.
 
 
-.. class:: HTTPSHandler()
+.. class:: HTTPSHandler(debuglevel=0, context=None, check_hostname=None)
 
-   A class to handle opening of HTTPS URLs.
+   A class to handle opening of HTTPS URLs.  *context* and *check_hostname*
+   have the same meaning as in :class:`http.client.HTTPSConnection`.
+
+   .. versionchanged:: 3.2
+      *context* and *check_hostname* were added.
 
 
 .. class:: FileHandler()