The sign and encrypt engine provides a consistent configuration of keys and certificates for both signing and encryption. You can define algorithms and parameters and reference keys from an HSM (for most use-cases) or from PKCS#12 files (always supported).

Structure Of The Configuration File

Below is an example of the XML configuration. On Docker deployments it is located in docker/compose/identitymanager/config/signencrypt.xml, on WAR deployments it is located in WEB-INF/classes/engineSignEncryptConfig.xml of IDM Admin and IDM Operator.
There are also several tools including a similar configuration file.

Code Block

language	xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<engineSignEncrypt>
    <descriptors>
        <descriptor name="EncryptedFields" version="1">
            <type algorithm="AES/CBC/PKCS7Padding" size="256" result="NX02" key="encCert" 
                  asymCipher="RSA/None/OAEPWithSHA384AndMGF1Padding"/>
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="ConfigZipEncrypter" version="1">
            <type algorithm="AES/CBC/PKCS7Padding" size="256" key="configZipEncrypterCert"
                  asymCipher="RSA/None/OAEPWithSHA384AndMGF1Padding"/>
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="ConfigZipSigner" version="1">
            <type algorithm="SHA-256" key="configZipSignerCert" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="ObjectHistorySigner" version="1">
            <type algorithm="SHA-256" key="objectHistorySignerCert" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="SignEmailDescriptor" version="1">
            <type algorithm="SHA256withRSA" key="emailSigningCert" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="hermodDeviceEnc" version="1">
            <type algorithm="SHA256withRSA" key="serverCert" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="SelfServiceJWTSigner" version="1">
            <type algorithm="RSA" key="selfServiceJWTSignerCert" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="ContentProviderJWSSigner" version="1">
            <type algorithm="RSA" key="contentProviderJWSSignerCert" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="att_external-attestation-1" version="1">
            <type algorithm="SHA256withRSA" key="attestationKey_mobile_1" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="att_external-attestation-2" version="1">
            <type algorithm="SHA256withRSA" key="attestationKey_mobile_2" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="att_external-attestation-3" version="1">
            <type algorithm="SHA256withRSA" key="attestationKey_mobile_3" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="att_external-attestation-4" version="1">
            <type algorithm="SHA256withRSA" key="attestationKey_mobile_4" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="att_ATTESTATION" version="1">
            <type algorithm="SHA256withRSA" key="attestationKey_mobile_pda_def" />
        </descriptor>
    </descriptors>
    <keys>
        <key name="encCert">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:hybridEncKeypair.p12" pin="1234"/>
        </key>
        <key name="configZipEncrypterCert">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:encryptConfig.p12" pin="1234"/>
        </key>
        <key name="configZipSignerCert">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:signConfig.p12" pin="1234"/>
        </key>
        <key name="objectHistorySignerCert">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:sign.p12" pin="1234"/>
        </key>
        <key name="selfServiceJWTSignerCert">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:signJWT.p12" pin="1234"/>
        </key>
        <key name="contentProviderJWSSignerCert">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:signJWS.p12" pin="1234"/>
        </key>
        <key name="emailSigningCert">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:emailSigning.p12" pin="1234"/>
        </key>
        <key name="serverCert">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:deviceEncCA.p12" pin="1234"/>
        </key>
        <key name="attestationKey_mobile_1">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:attKeyMobile1.p12" pin="936584967"/>
        </key>
        <key name="attestationKey_mobile_2">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:attKeyMobile2.p12" pin="873145568"/>
        </key>
        <key name="attestationKey_mobile_3">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:attKeyMobile3.p12" pin="8564789632"/>
        </key>
        <key name="attestationKey_mobile_4">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:attKeyMobile4.p12" pin="9263564893"/>
        </key>
        <key name="attestationKey_mobile_pda_def">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:attKeyMobileDef.p12" pin="2586453793"/>
        </key>
    </keys>
</engineSignEncrypt>

The configuration is divided into entries for descriptors and keys, with each descriptor referencing one of the key-entries.

Descriptor Naming

IDM references descriptors by their name. Some names are fixed (e.g. ConfigZipEncrypter is always used for encrypting configuration files), some can be named arbitrarily (e.g. descriptors for PIN blob decryption).

Descriptor Versioning

Some descriptors support multiple versions. For example, you can replace the key of the ObjectHistorySigner by adding a descriptor of this name with a newer version, and leaving the existing descriptor with the old version configured. This will cause any new signatures to be created with the new key, but you can still verify signatures made with the old one.

See the following example:

Code Block

language	xml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<engineSignEncrypt>
    <descriptors>
        <descriptor name="ObjectHistorySigner" version="2">
            <type algorithm="SHA-256" key="newHistorySigner" />
        </descriptor>
        <descriptor name="ObjectHistorySigner" version="1">
            <type algorithm="SHA-256" key="oldHistorySigner" />
        </descriptor>       
        <!-- others descriptors -->
    </descriptors>
    <keys>
        <key name="newHistorySigner">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:sign_new.p12" pin="1234"/>
        </key>
        <key name="oldHistorySigner">
            <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:sign_old.p12" pin="1234"/>
        </key>
        <!-- other keys -->
    </keys>
</engineSignEncrypt>

There are also descriptors which cannot be versioned, e.g. EncryptedFields. For those the version always needs to be set to 1.

Bootstrapping Requirements

Note

Important: Most descriptors need to have their certificates and keys bootstrapped before starting the application(s) for the first time.

IDM 24.R1 makes a number of significant changes:

PKCS#12 files containing demo keys are no longer included to avoid them ending up in productive environments.
Various checks are introduced - see Sign and Encrypt engine bootstrap verification:
- The old demo keys are explicitly blacklisted and IDM will print an error log message, if any of those is encountered on startup of IDM Operator and IDM Admin.
- IDM Admin and IDM Operator will no longer start without bootstrapping, as most descriptors have missing keys/certs by default.
- IDM Admin and IDM Operator check on startup whether the configured key for encrypted fields matches the database and will abort if that is not the case.
- IDM Operator checks on startup if the currently configured key for history signing matches the database and will abort if that is not the case.
Bootstrap CA/certificate/key generation tooling has been refined, it now works properly on Docker and is limited to dev-/test-use (see Bootstrapping Development And Test Systems).
For productive environments manual bootstrapping via Certificate Authorities is required - see Bootstrap Descriptors of the sign and encrypt engine in Identity Manager for details.
Pin scrambling of signencrypt.xml now works in Docker deployments via dedicated tooling. See Scramble sensitive data in Identity Manager files.
Each descriptor now references its own key by default, instead of e.g. ZIP signing and history signing sharing the same key.

Whenever object history entries or secrets were created with the demo keys, a simple bootstrapping is no longer possible without resigning the object history (using the batch_re-sign_history tool) and re-encrypting the secrets (using the batch_secretfieldstore_change_encryption_key tool, see Change Encryption key of secret field store).

...

Most descriptors, such as EncryptedFields and ObjectHistorySigner, always require proper bootstrapping for secure operation. However, depending on the subset of IDM features to be used, certain descriptors may be configured with placeholder keys and certificates (e.g. SignEmailDescriptor, if E-Mail signing in IDM is not enabled).

See Bootstrap Descriptors of the sign and encrypt engine in Identity Manager detailing the specific requirements for each descriptor.

...

Note
Do not use the bootstrapping tools to generate keys and certificates for productive systems as this is a security risk!

XML Elements

Descriptor

See the tables below the example for more information on the different possible attributes of a descriptor/-type.

Descriptor example

Code Block

language	xml

<descriptor name="ObjectHistorySigner" version="1">
    <type algorithm="SHA-256" key="objectHistorySignerCert" />
</descriptor>

...

descriptor element attribute

...

Description

...

name

...

Used by Identity Manager to refer to this descriptor. There might be different descriptors with the same name but with different versions.

...

version

...

A numeric value that denotes the descriptor's version. This is only needed for the ObjectHistorySigner.
A new version of a descriptor is needed, for example, when an old key needs to be replaced.
The descriptor with the highest version number is used. Verification of Object History entries will automatically select the right descriptor version.

...

Attribute of the type element inside descriptor

...

Description

...

algorithm

...

For EncryptedFields/ConfigZipEncrypter: symmetric algorithm to be used, usually AES/CBC/PKCS7Padding.

For SelfServiceJWTSigner/ContentProviderJWSSigner: always RSA.

For ConfigZipSigner/ObjectHistorySigner: hashing algorithm to be used (for example, SHA-256).

For SignEmailDescriptor/hermodDeviceEnc/att_* and pin-blob decryption descriptors:
signature algorithm to be used (for example, SHA256withRSA).

For idopteAuthentication: always NoneWithRSA.

...

size

...

For EncryptedFields/ConfigZipEncrypter only.
Size of the symmetric key, either 128or 256 (recommended).

...

result

...

For EncryptedFields only.
Output format, currently always NX02.

...

key

...

The descriptor’s key. Refers to a key defined in the same document.

...

asymCipher

...

For EncryptedFields/ConfigZipEncrypter only.
Cipher definition, e.g. RSA/None/OAEPWithSHA384AndMGF1Padding.

When used with an HSM, you need to adjust the cipher format to be compatible with the JCE provider
used for HSM access.
For example, instead of the above cipher definition, specify RSA/ECB/OAEPWithSHA-384AndMGF1Padding
(ECBinstead of Noneand SHA-384 instead of SHA384).

...

initVector

...

Only needed for migrating EncryptedFields from SmartAct or ProAct. A fixed Initialization Vector (IV).

For other descriptors, omit this attribute in order to use randomly generated IVs.

Key

See the tables below the example for more information about the key/-type.

Key example

Code Block

language	xml

<key name="objectHistorySignerCert">
    <type name="pkcs12" locationValue="classpath:sign.p12" pin="1234"/>
</key>

...

key element attribute

...

Description

...

name

...

Used by descriptors' key attribute to reference this key.

...

Attribute of the type element inside key

...

Description

...

name

...

Type of storage: pkcs12or HSM.

...

locationValue

...

For docker:
- For a software keystore (pkcs12): place the keystore under docker/compose/certs before creating the container with docker compose. Then set its location as absolute path, prefixed with file: pointing to the mounted file in/certs,
  for example: locationValue="file:/certs/keystore.p12".
  Note: Default attestation keys are referenced from the classpath, e.g. locationValue="classpath:attKeyMobileDef.p12". Change this only if you need your own keys.
- For an HSM: ensure the PKCS11 library is mounted into the container, then use the container’s path of the PKCS11 library, without filename extension, for example: locationValue="/usr/local/lib/libpkcs11hsm"
For WAR file deployment:
- For a software keystore: place the keystore under WEB-INF/classes and set its location, prefixed with classpath:,
  for example: locationValue="classpath:keystore.p12"
- For an HSM: use the path of the PKCS11 library, without filename extension,
  for example: locationValue="/usr/local/lib/libpkcs11hsm"

...

PIN for the keystore or HSM.

To avoid having clear text PINs in this file, the pin should be scrambled.
That can be achieved by setting it with pin.encrypted="1234" instead of pin="1234".

For WAR deployments the pin will then be scrambled on the next (re-)start of Tomcat.

...

Additional Information

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title	Useful links

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Version	Old Version 61	New Version 62
Changes made by	Paul Zachos	Paul Zachos
Saved on	Apr 11, 2024	Apr 11, 2024

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Structure Of The Configuration File

Descriptor Naming

Descriptor Versioning

Bootstrapping Requirements

XML Elements

Descriptor

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Additional Information