JSON Web Token (JWT) with RSA encryption (2024)

RSA is a popular algorithmfor asymmetric (public key) encryption that was established more than 40 yearsago. Encrypting a JWT for a given recipient requires their public RSA key. Thedecryption takes place with the corresponding private RSA key, which therecipient must keep secret at alltimes.

To create an RSA encrypter with Nimbus JOSE+JWT for a given publickey:

JWEEncrypter encrypter = new RSAEncrypter(rsaPublicKey);

To create an RSAdecrypter:

JWEDecrypter decrypter = new RSADecrypter(rsaPrivateKey);

An absolutely essential security aspect in public key encryption is ensuringthe data is encrypted for the intended recipient and not some other party,which will compromise the data's confidentiality. One solution is public keyinfrastructure, suchas based on the PKIX / X.509 standard(used for SSL/TLS on the Internet and in otherplaces).

The actual public key encryption is a two step process, to work around an RSAlimitation that makes it unfeasible to encrypt data that is more than a fewhundred bytes long. The library takes care of this internally, so you only needto supply the public key, the RSA algorithm name (alg) and the contentencryption algorithm name (enc) in order to encrypt a piece of data, such asthe claims for aJWT.

If you are curious know what those two encryption stepsare:

1. A single use secret AES or ChaCha20 key (called Content Encryption Key, orCEK) is generated to perform symmetrical encryption on the JWT payload.These symmetric ciphers are super efficient and can process plain text of(almost) arbitrary size. The type and length of the CEK to be generated isdetermined by the JWE "enc" header parameter. For example, A128GCM willcause a 128-bit AES CEK to begenerated.
2. The generated CEK, which fits the RSA size limitation, is then encryptedwith RSA according to the JWE "alg" header parameter, and gets includedas part of theJWT.

There are two standard RSA algorithm types for JSON WebEncryption (JWE), identified bythe JWE "alg" headerparameter:

You can combine a JWE "alg" with any of the following contentencryption algorithms,identified by the JWE "enc" headerparameter:

The following example demonstrates RSA-OAEP-256 with A128GCM encryptionof a JWT, where the recipient'sjava.security.interfaces.RSAPublicKeyis used to encrypt the JWT. The recipient can then decrypt the JWT with itsjava.security.interfaces.RSAPrivateKey.

Check out /src/test/java/com/nimbusds/jwt/EncryptedJWTTest.java to see the
completecode.

import java.util.*;import java.security.interfaces.*;import javax.crypto.*;import com.nimbusds.jose.*;import com.nimbusds.jose.crypto.*;import com.nimbusds.jwt.*;// Compose the JWT claims setDate now = new Date();JWTClaimsSet jwtClaims = new JWTClaimsSet.Builder() .issuer("https://openid.net") .subject("alice") .audience(Arrays.asList("https://app-one.com", "https://app-two.com")) .expirationTime(new Date(now.getTime() + 1000*60*10)) // expires in 10 minutes .notBeforeTime(now) .issueTime(now) .jwtID(UUID.randomUUID().toString()) .build();System.out.println(jwtClaims.toJSONObject());// Produces// {// "iss" : "https://openid.net",// "sub" : "alice",// "aud" : [ "https://app-one.com" , "https://app-two.com" ],// "exp" : 1364293137871,// "nbf" : 1364292537871,// "iat" : 1364292537871,// "jti" : "165a7bab-de06-4695-a2dd-9d8d6b40e443"// }// Request JWT encrypted with RSA-OAEP-256 and 128-bit AES/GCMJWEHeader header = new JWEHeader( JWEAlgorithm.RSA_OAEP_256, EncryptionMethod.A128GCM);// Create the encrypted JWT objectEncryptedJWT jwt = new EncryptedJWT(header, jwtClaims);// Create an encrypter with the specified public RSA keyRSAEncrypter encrypter = new RSAEncrypter(publicKey);// Do the actual encryptionjwt.encrypt(encrypter);// Serialise to JWT compact formString jwtString = jwt.serialize();System.out.println(jwtString);// Produces//// eyJhbGciOiJSU0EtT0FFUCIsImVuYyI6IkExMjhHQ00ifQ.K52jFwAQJH-// DxMhtaq7sg5tMuot_mT5dm1DR_01wj6ZUQQhJFO02vPI44W5nDjC5C_v4p// W1UiJa3cwb5y2Rd9kSvb0ZxAqGX9c4Z4zouRU57729ML3V05UArUhck9Zv// ssfkDW1VclingL8Lfa*gRUs2z95UkwhiZyaKpmrgqpKX8azQFGNLBvEjXnx// -xoDFZIYwHOno290HOpig3aUsDxhsioweiXbeLXxLeRsivaLwUWRUZfHRC// _HGAo8KSF4gQZmeJtRgai5mz6qgbVkg7jPQyZFtM5_ul0UKHE2y0AtWm8I// zDE_rbAV14OCRZJ6n38X5urVFFE5sdphdGsNlA.gjI_RIFWZXJwaO9R.oa// E5a-z0N1MW9FBkhKeKeFa5e7hxVXOuANZsNmBYYT8G_xlXkMD0nz4fIaGt// uWd3t9Xp-kufvvfD-xOnAs2SBX_Y1kYGPto4mibBjIrXQEjDsKyKwndxzr// utN9csmFwqWhx1sLHMpJkgsnfLTi9yWBPKH5Krx23IhoDGoSfqOquuhxn0// y0WkuqH1R3z-fluUs6sxx9qx6NFVS1NRQ-LVn9sWT5yx8m9AQ_ng8MBWz2// BfBTV0tjliV74ogNDikNXTAkD9rsWFV0IX4IpA.sOLijuVySaKI-FYUaBy// wpg// Parsejwt = EncryptedJWT.parse(jwtString);// Create a decrypter with the specified private RSA keyRSADecrypter decrypter = new RSADecrypter(privateKey);// Decryptjwt.decrypt(decrypter);// Retrieve JWT claimsSystem.out.println(jwt.getJWTClaimsSet().getIssuer());;System.out.println(jwt.getJWTClaimsSet().getSubject());System.out.println(jwt.getJWTClaimsSet().getAudience().size());System.out.println(jwt.getJWTClaimsSet().getExpirationTime());System.out.println(jwt.getJWTClaimsSet().getNotBeforeTime());System.out.println(jwt.getJWTClaimsSet().getIssueTime());System.out.println(jwt.getJWTClaimsSet().getJWTID());