Objective-C

Export an Encrypted PKCS #8 Private Key as Encoded Text

Demonstrates the Chilkat PrivateKey.GetPkcs8EncryptedENC method, which exports the key as password-protected PKCS #8 DER and encodes the encrypted DER as text. The first argument names the binary encoding and the second is the password. The cipher is selected by Pkcs8EncryptAlg.

Note: The file paths are relative to the application's current working directory. Absolute paths may also be used. Supply the paths appropriate to your own environment.

Background: This combines encryption with text encoding: the key is protected by a passphrase and returned as a string, ideal for storing an encrypted key in a text-only medium such as JSON or an environment variable. It is the encrypted counterpart to GetPkcs8ENC. Source the password securely.

Chilkat Objective-C Downloads

Download Chilkat for Objective-C

Objective-C

#import <CkoPrivateKey.h>
#import <NSString.h>

BOOL success = NO;

//  Load a private key to export.
CkoPrivateKey *privKey = [[CkoPrivateKey alloc] init];
success = [privKey LoadPemFile: @"qa_data/private.pem"];
if (success == NO) {
    NSLog(@"%@",privKey.LastErrorText);
    return;
}

//  The key password is not hard-coded in a real application; obtain it from an interactive
//  prompt, environment variable, or a secrets vault.
NSString *password = @"myKeyPassword";

//  Export as password-protected PKCS #8 DER, then encode the encrypted DER as text.  The 1st
//  argument names the binary encoding and the 2nd is the password.  The cipher is selected by the
//  Pkcs8EncryptAlg property.
NSString *encoded = [privKey GetPkcs8EncryptedENC: @"base64" password: password];
if (privKey.LastMethodSuccess == NO) {
    NSLog(@"%@",privKey.LastErrorText);
    return;
}

NSLog(@"%@",encoded);