wget doesn't support https

Question

I want to download https://example.com using the wget command, but it says “unsupported/unrecognized protocol”. I tried using the --secure protocol='' but that does not work. I downloaded the tar file from GNU wget and tried configuring that but I failed.

Here is an example of what I see:

bash-2.05$ wget https://www.facebook.com/
https://www.facebook.com/: Unknown/unsupported protocol.
bash-2.05$

Hi folks thanks for the answers, the verified the version of my wget it says as below

bash-2.05$ wget -V
GNU Wget 1.6

Copyright (C) 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 2000 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
GNU General Public License for more details.

Originally written by Hrvoje Niksic <[email protected]>.

and I have no idea if my wget is compiled by SSL and the SSL is enabled or not. Could you please let me know how to compile the wget command. I tried running the configure file and then typed make command, that gives me command not found error. Even after running the configuration file it does not give me any wget file created in /usr/local/.

bash-2.05$ cd wget-1.10.1
bash-2.05$ ./configure --prefix=/usr/local --with-ssl
bash-2.05$ make
bash: make: command not found

the version I downloaded is wget-1.10.1.tar

Answer 1

Solution

Verify your wget binary is compiled with SSL support enabled. My output when I try the command you gave:

$ wget https://www.facebook.com
--2015-07-19 15:27:17--  https://www.facebook.com/
Resolving www.facebook.com (www.facebook.com)... 31.13.66.1, 2a03:2880:f013:1:face:b00c:0:1
Connecting to www.facebook.com (www.facebook.com)|31.13.66.1|:443... connected.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 302 Found
Location: https://www.facebook.com/unsupportedbrowser [following]
--2015-07-19 15:27:18--  https://www.facebook.com/unsupportedbrowser
Reusing existing connection to www.facebook.com:443.
HTTP request sent, awaiting response... 200 OK
Length: unspecified [text/html]
Saving to: ‘index.html’

index.html                                                              [ <=>                                                                                                                                                                 ]  29.21K  --.-KB/s   in 0.04s  

2015-07-19 15:27:18 (775 KB/s) - ‘index.html’ saved [29916]

$

Given no fully Qualified URL downloads the default page index.html which contains tags etc. All this page will tell me when viewed via a browser is that my browser is not supported, in other words: We don't support fetching of pages via wget.

$ eix wget

[I] net-misc/wget
     Available versions:  1.16 ~1.16.1 ~1.16.2 ~1.16.3 {debug gnutls idn ipv6 nls ntlm pcre +ssl static test uuid zlib}
     Installed versions:  1.16(11:25:57 AM 07/19/2015)(idn ipv6 nls pcre ssl zlib -debug -gnutls -ntlm -static -test -uuid)
     Homepage:            http://www.gnu.org/software/wget/
     Description:         Network utility to retrieve files from the WWW

Per Comment

Here's what a version output looks like, in case you've never seen Gentoo based output (Notice -DHAVE_LIBSSL):

$ wget -V
wget -V
GNU Wget 1.16 built on linux-gnu.

+digest +https +ipv6 +iri +large-file +nls -ntlm +opie -psl +ssl/openssl 

Wgetrc: 
    /etc/wgetrc (system)
Locale: 
    /usr/share/locale 
Compile: 
    x86_64-pc-linux-gnu-gcc -DHAVE_CONFIG_H 
    -DSYSTEM_WGETRC="/etc/wgetrc" -DLOCALEDIR="/usr/share/locale" -I. 
    -I../lib -I../lib -DHAVE_LIBSSL -march=amdfam10 -O2 -pipe 
Link: 
    x86_64-pc-linux-gnu-gcc -DHAVE_LIBSSL -march=amdfam10 -O2 -pipe 
    -Wl,-O1 -Wl,--as-needed -lpcre -lssl -lcrypto -lz -lidn ftp-opie.o 
    openssl.o ../lib/libgnu.a 

Copyright (C) 2014 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later
<http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

Originally written by Hrvoje Niksic <[email protected]>.
Please send bug reports and questions to <[email protected]>.

---

Notice that ssl does not contain a minus in the Installed Versions line from the Gentoo based output, meaning I have compiled SSL support on my Gentoo box. In order to go further, would you please update your question with your distribution.

Answer 2

In case anyone else is coming across this error from within vmWare ESXi or another BusyBox environment, you aren't actually using wget:

Output from wget -V for me:

wget: invalid option -- 'V'
BusyBox v1.22.1 (2018-07-23 19:34:44 PDT) multi-call binary.

Usage: wget [-csq] [-O FILE] [-Y on/off] [-P DIR] [-U AGENT] URL...

Retrieve files via HTTP or FTP

    -s  Spider mode - only check file existence
    -c  Continue retrieval of aborted transfer
    -q  Quiet
    -P DIR  Save to DIR (default .)
    -O FILE Save to FILE ('-' for stdout)
    -U STR  Use STR for User-Agent header
    -Y  Use proxy ('on' or 'off')

So you're out of luck. Transfer the file using a different method such as SCP from your workstation.

Answer 3

Try removing the "s"... I mean just use http.

Most of the times there is a redirection from http to https active and wget seems to work with it.

Hit the address in your browser with plain http and if you get redirected to https your wget will probably work.

So.. wget http://example.com/file