< Cryptography
Download and install the OpenSSL runtimes. If you are running Windows, grab the Cygwin package.
OpenSSL can generate several kinds of public/private keypairs.RSA is the most common kind of keypair generation.[1]
OpenSSL comes shipped with Mac OS X version 10.6.2 onwards. You can use Terminal to run OpenSSL (search for 'terminal' using the search bar in the top right of your screen on your desktop) to open the terminal window and then run the commands below. Notes: You may need to run each OpenSSL command lines with elevated privileges - add sudo before. Using openssl to generate HMAC using a binary key If you want to do a quick command-line generation of a HMAC, then the openssl command is useful. In this section, will see how to use OpenSSL commands that are specific to creating and verifying the private keys. Create a Private Key Below is the command to create a password-protected and, 2048-bit encrypted private key file (ex. Domain.key) – $ openssl genrsa -des3 -out domain.key 2048. To encrypt our private key, we use the following code: openssl rsa -in key.pem -des3 -out enc-key.pem Once the key file has been encrypted, you will then be prompted to create a password. Next, we can extract the public key from the file key.pem with this command: openssl rsa -in key.pem -pubout -out pub-key.pem. The examples below use the new EVPDigestSign. and EVPDigestVerify. functions to demonstarte signing and verification. The first example uses an HMAC, and the second example uses RSA key pairs. Additionally, the code for the examples are available for download. Note: CMAC is only supported since the version 1.1.0 of OpenSSL.
Other popular ways of generating RSA public key / private key pairs include PuTTYgen and ssh-keygen.[2][3]
Generate an RSA keypair with a 2048 bit private key[edit]
Openssl Create Key File
Execute command: 'openssl genpkey -algorithm RSA -out private_key.pem -pkeyopt rsa_keygen_bits:2048'[4] (previously “openssl genrsa -out private_key.pem 2048”)
e.g.
Make sure to prevent other users from reading your key by executing chmod go-r private_key.pem afterward.
Extracting the public key from an RSA keypair[edit]
Execute command: 'openssl rsa -pubout -in private_key.pem -out public_key.pem'
e.g.
A new file is created, public_key.pem, with the public key.
It is relatively easy to do some cryptographic calculations to calculate the public key from the prime1 and prime2 values in the public key file.However, OpenSSL has already pre-calculated the public key and stored it in the private key file.So this command doesn't actually do any cryptographic calculation -- it merely copies the public key bytes out of the file and writes the Base64 PEM encoded version of those bytes into the output public key file.[5]
Viewing the key elements[edit]
Execute command: 'openssl rsa -text -in private_key.pem'
All parts of private_key.pem are printed to the screen. This includes the modulus (also referred to as public key and n), public exponent (also referred to as e and exponent; default value is 0x010001), private exponent, and primes used to create keys (prime1, also called p, and prime2, also called q), a few other variables used to perform RSA operations faster, and the Base64 PEM encoded version of all that data.[6](The Base64 PEM encoded version of all that data is identical to the private_key.pem file).
Password-less login[edit]
Often a person will set up an automated backup process that periodically backs up all the content on one 'working' computer onto some other 'backup' computer.
Because that person wants this process to run every night, even if no human is anywhere near either one of these computers, using a 'password-protected' private key won't work -- that person wants the backup to proceed right away, not wait until some human walks by and types in the password to unlock the private key.Many of these people generate 'a private key with no password'.[7]Some of these people, instead, generate a private key with a password,and then somehow type in that password to 'unlock' the private key every time the server reboots so that automated toolscan make use of the password-protected keys.[8][3]
Using Openssl To Create Keys For Mac Windows 10
Further reading[edit]
- ↑Key Generation
- ↑Michael Stahnke.'Pro OpenSSH'.p. 247.
- ↑ ab'SourceForge.net Documentation: SSH Key Overview'
- ↑'genpkey(1) - Linux man page'
- ↑'Public – Private key encryption using OpenSSL'
- ↑'OpenSSL 1024 bit RSA Private Key Breakdown'
- ↑'DreamHost: Personal Backup'.
- ↑Troy Johnson.'Using Rsync and SSH: Keys, Validating, and Automation'.
- Internet_Technologies/SSH describes how to use 'ssh-keygen' and 'ssh-copy-id' on your local machine so you can quickly and securely ssh from your local machine to a remote host.
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