diff --git a/smb/CMakeLists.txt b/smb/CMakeLists.txt
--- a/smb/CMakeLists.txt
+++ b/smb/CMakeLists.txt
@@ -10,6 +10,10 @@
 check_include_file(utime.h HAVE_UTIME_H)
 
 configure_file(config-smb.h.cmake ${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/config-smb.h)
+foreach(PROTOCOL smb cifs)
+   configure_file(smb.protocol.cmake ${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/${PROTOCOL}.protocol)
+   install(FILES ${CMAKE_CURRENT_BINARY_DIR}/${PROTOCOL}.protocol DESTINATION ${KDE_INSTALL_KSERVICES5DIR})
+endforeach()
 
 set(kio_smb_PART_SRCS 
    kio_smb.cpp 
@@ -53,6 +57,5 @@
 ########### install files ###############
 
 install( FILES smb-network.desktop  DESTINATION  ${KDE_INSTALL_DATADIR}/konqueror/dirtree/remote )
-install( FILES smb.protocol  DESTINATION  ${KDE_INSTALL_KSERVICES5DIR} )
 install( FILES smb-network.desktop  DESTINATION  ${KDE_INSTALL_DATADIR}/remoteview )
 
diff --git a/smb/kio_smb_browse.cpp b/smb/kio_smb_browse.cpp
--- a/smb/kio_smb_browse.cpp
+++ b/smb/kio_smb_browse.cpp
@@ -183,10 +183,24 @@
 }
 
 //===========================================================================
-// TODO: complete checking
-QUrl SMBSlave::checkURL(const QUrl& kurl) const
+// TODO: complete checking <-- what does that even mean?
+// TODO: why is this not part of SMBUrl or at the very least URL validation should
+//    be 100% shared between this and SMBUrl. Notably SMBUrl has code that looks
+//    to do a similar thing but is much less complete.
+QUrl SMBSlave::checkURL(const QUrl &kurl_) const
 {
-    qCDebug(KIO_SMB) << "checkURL " << kurl;
+    qCDebug(KIO_SMB) << "checkURL " << kurl_;
+
+    QUrl kurl(kurl_);
+    // We treat cifs as an alias but need to translate it to smb.
+    // https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=327295
+    // It's not IANA registered and also libsmbc internally expects
+    // smb URIs so we do very broadly coerce cifs to smb.
+    // Also see SMBUrl.
+    if (kurl.scheme() == "cifs") {
+        kurl.setScheme("smb");
+    }
+
     QString surl = kurl.url();
     //transform any links in the form smb:/ into smb://
     if (surl.startsWith(QLatin1String("smb:/"))) {
diff --git a/smb/kio_smb_internal.cpp b/smb/kio_smb_internal.cpp
--- a/smb/kio_smb_internal.cpp
+++ b/smb/kio_smb_internal.cpp
@@ -51,6 +51,14 @@
     : QUrl(kurl)
   //-----------------------------------------------------------------------
 {
+    // We treat cifs as an alias but need to translate it to smb.
+    // https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=327295
+    // It's not IANA registered and also libsmbc internally expects
+    // smb URIs so we do very broadly coerce cifs to smb.
+    // Also see SMBSlave::checkURL.
+    if (scheme() == "cifs") {
+        setScheme("smb");
+    }
     updateCache();
 }
 
diff --git a/smb/smb.protocol b/smb/smb.protocol.cmake
rename from smb/smb.protocol
rename to smb/smb.protocol.cmake
--- a/smb/smb.protocol
+++ b/smb/smb.protocol.cmake
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 [Protocol]
 exec=kf5/kio/smb
-protocol=smb
+protocol=@PROTOCOL@
 input=none
 output=filesystem
 listing=Name,Type,Size,Date,Access,Owner,Group