Currently, the default source for `guix pull` is . It's suboptimal to download the Guix source code over HTTP, since the data can be mutated and recorded in transit. [0] The Savannah admins have been working tirelessly to improve the Savannah infrastructure, and they will soon announce the public availability of Git served over HTTPS. [1] HTTPS is not a security panacea but, in my opinion, we should use it if it's available, at least until `guix pull` can verify commit signatures. However, it's a little harder to get right than HTTP. For example, `guix pull` could fail if there is a problem with the user's certificate store, or if their clock is wrong. Does anyone have any specific concerns or advice about changing the value of %snapshot-url in (guix scripts pull) to use the HTTPS URL? Should the change be that simple, or should we do more? The attached patch works for me on a foreign distro when SSL_CERT_DIR and SSL_CERT_FILE are set as described in the manual (section 7.2.9 X.509 Certificates) and GnuTLS-Guile is available in my environment. [0] Discussion of the general problems with `guix pull`: http://bugs.gnu.org/22883 [1] http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/savannah-hackers-public/2017-02/msg00034.html