Getting a PrivateKey object from a .p12 file in Java

Question

As the title suggests, I have .p12 file required for google service account api access. In order to get the credential to connect to the api, there's a field .setServiceAccountPrivateKey(PrivateKey privateKey). So, what's the easiest way in which I can do this? I have a resources folder which is in my classpath so if I add the p12 file there, I can get the resource from getClass().getResource() as either an inputStream or a URL. I've tried the URL method but it doesn't work (I get a "URI is not hierarchical" error trying to create a File object from URL.toURI()).

Answer 1

You can load your .p12 file using the ClassLoader.getResourceAsStream(String) method, load it to a KeyStore and them get the key from the KeyStore.

KeyStore keystore = KeyStore.getInstance("PKCS12");
keystore.load(this.getClass().getClassLoader().getResourceAsStream("keyFile.p12"), p12Password.toCharArray());
PrivateKey key = (PrivateKey)keystore.getKey(keyAlias, p12Password.toCharArray());

ClassLoader.getResourceAsStream(String) loads resources from any location provided they're already on the classpath, there's no need to specify a path to the file.

keyAlias is the name of the entry in your p12 file that corresponds to the private key. PKCS12 files can contain multiple entries, so you need some way to indicate which entry you want to access. The alias is how this is achieved.

If you're not sure what the alias for your private key is, you can use the keytool utility from the command line to list the contents of your p12 file. This tool is included with all JRE and JDK installations.

keytool -list -keystore keyFile.p12 -storepass password -storetype PKCS12

Output

Keystore type: PKCS12
Keystore provider: SunJSSE

Your keystore contains 1 entry

yourKeyAlias, Sep 4, 2013, PrivateKeyEntry,
Certificate fingerprint (MD5): 48:A8:C4:12:8E:4A:8A:AD:58:81:26:90:E7:3D:C8:04