"cURL error 60" when trying to update WordPress

This error applies to websites running on an older version of WordPress. It is highly recommended that you keep your websites up-to-date at all times.

Problem

On older versions of WordPress (before version 5.2.21), you may encounter the following error when trying to update:

Download failed. cURL error 60: SSL certificate problem: unable to get local issuer certificate

This would occur because WordPress would have used the http protocol to obtain updates from their own servers. WordPress standards have changed since, and updates are no longer possible via http.

They would have switched to https and are now enforcing updates via this protocol.

Solution

In order to resolve this, you would need to carry out a manual update to the latest version.

We recommend creating a backup before proceeding with the update.

WordPress has documentation on how you can manually update your website here:

https://wordpress.org/documentation/article/updating-wordpress/

We would advise consulting with your Web Developer on updating your website if you are having any issues.

In order to carry out both backup and the manual update, the use of FTP would be required.
FTP (File Transfer Protocol) is a method used to download and upload files to/from the server.
You will need an FTP client (Such as FileZilla) to use FTP.

Once you have an FTP client installed, you will need to connect to the server.