CODEWITHSUNDEEP
javassl
user3629892
user3629892

Reputation: 3046

Which keystore is used when null is passed to KeyManagerFactory.init() in Java?

When I execute the following code:

KeyManagerFactory keyManagerFactory = KeyManagerFactory             
                .getInstance(KeyManagerFactory.getDefaultAlgorithm());
keyManagerFactory.init(null, null);

and then the subsequent establishment of the ssl connection, I get a Exception in thread "main" javax.net.ssl.SSLHandshakeException: Received fatal alert: handshake_failure and not a NullPointerException or something. Which keystore is used then? Or is the NPE hidden?

Upvotes: 2

Views: 1916

Answers (1)

Bruno
Bruno

Reputation: 122719

When null is used as the keystore argument of KeyManagerFactory.init(..., ...), no keystore is used (it's in fact using an empty list internally).

There's no "hidden" NullPointerException as such, and there's no reason why there should be one. Of course, using a null value here and an empty collection has consequences when trying to use a keymanager, but not all SSL/TLS connections require a keystore (e.g. client-side without client certificate or anonymous cipher suites).

(Note that, although there is no default value for the keystore, there is one for the truststore, so that default value would be used with TrustManagerFactory.init(null).)

Upvotes: 6

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