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How to properly recreate SecretKey from string

I'm trying to make an encryption-decryption app. I've got two classes - one with functions to generate the key, encrypt and decrypt, second one for JavaFX GUI. In the GUI class I've got 4 textareas: 1st to write text to encrypt, 2nd for encrypted text, 3rd for the key (String encodedKey = Base64.getEncoder().encodeToString(klucz.getEncoded());) and 4th for decrypted text.
The problem is, I am not able to decrypt the text. I'm trying to recreate the SecretKey like this:
String encodedKey = textAreaKey.getText();
byte[] decodedKey = Base64.getDecoder().decode(encodedKey);
SecretKey klucz = new SecretKeySpec(decodedKey, "DESede");
When I encrypt the key looks like this: com.sun.crypto.provider.DESedeKey#4f964d80 and when I try to recreate it: javax.crypto.spec.SecretKeySpec#4f964d80 and I'm getting javax.crypto.IllegalBlockSizeException: Input length must be multiple of 8 when decrypting with padded cipher
Here is my 1st class:
public class Encryption {
public static SecretKey generateKey() throws NoSuchAlgorithmException {
Security.addProvider(new com.sun.crypto.provider.SunJCE());
KeyGenerator keygen = KeyGenerator.getInstance("DESede");
keygen.init(168);
SecretKey klucz = keygen.generateKey();
return klucz;
}
static byte[] encrypt(byte[] plainTextByte, SecretKey klucz)
throws Exception {
Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("DESede/ECB/PKCS5Padding");
cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, klucz);
byte[] encryptedBytes = cipher.doFinal(plainTextByte);
return encryptedBytes;
}
static byte[] decrypt(byte[] encryptedBytes, SecretKey klucz)
throws Exception {
Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("DESede/ECB/PKCS5Padding");
cipher.init(Cipher.DECRYPT_MODE, klucz);
byte[] decryptedBytes = cipher.doFinal(encryptedBytes);
return decryptedBytes;
}
}
edit
btnEncrypt.setOnAction((ActionEvent event) -> {
try {
String plainText = textAreaToEncrypt.getText();
SecretKey klucz = Encryption.generateKey();
byte[] plainTextByte = plainText.getBytes();
byte[] encryptedBytes = Encryption.encrypt(plainTextByte, klucz);
String encryptedText = Base64.getEncoder().encodeToString(encryptedBytes);
textAreaEncryptedText.setText(encryptedText);
byte[] byteKey = klucz.getEncoded();
String stringKey = Base64.getEncoder().encodeToString(byteKey);
textAreaKey.setTextstringKey
} catch (Exception ex) {
ex.printStackTrace();
}
});
btnDecrypt.setOnAction((ActionEvent event) -> {
try {
String stringKey = textAreaKey.getText();
byte[] decodedKey = Base64.getDecoder().decode(encodedKey);
SecretKey klucz2 = new SecretKeySpec(decodedKey, "DESede");
String encryptedText = textAreaEncryptedText.getText();
byte[] encryptedBytes = Base64.getDecoder().decode(encryptedText.getBytes());
byte[] decryptedBytes = Encryption.decrypt(encryptedBytes, klucz2;
String decryptedText = Base64.getEncoder().encodeToString(decryptedBytes);
textAreaDecryptedText.setText(decryptedText);
} catch (Exception ex) {
ex.printStackTrace();
}
});

One of your problems is here:
String encryptedText = new String(encryptedBytes, "UTF8");
Generally, many byte sequences in cipher text are not valid UTF-8–encoded characters. When you try to create a String, this malformed sequences will be replaced with the "replacement character", and then information from the the cipher text is irretrievably lost. When you convert the String back to bytes and try to decrypt it, the corrupt cipher text raises an error.
If you need to represent the cipher text as a character string, use base-64 encoding, just as you do for the key.
The other principal problem is that you are aren't specifying the full transformation. You should specify the "mode" and "padding" of the cipher explicitly, like "DESede/ECB/PKCS5Padding".
The correct mode will depend on your assignment. ECB is generally not secure, but more secure modes add a bit of complexity that may be outside the scope of your assignment. Study your instructions and clarify the requirements with your teacher if necessary.

There are two main issues:
You should not use user entered password as a key (there are difference between them). The key must have specific size depending on the cipher (16 or 24 bytes for 3des)
Direct 3DES (DESede) is a block cipher encrypting 8 bytes at once. To encrypt multiple blocks, there are some methods defined how to do that properly. It is calls Block cipher mode.
For proper encryption you need to take care of a few more things
Creating a key from the password
Let's assume you want to use DESede (3des). The key must have fixed size - 16 or 24 bytes. To properly generate a key from password you should use PBKDF. Some people are sensitive to "must use", however neglecting this step really compromises the encryption security mainly using user-entered passwords.
For 3DES you can use :
int keySize = 16*8;
int iterations = 800000;
char[] password = "password".toCharArray();
SecureRandom random = new SecureRandom();
byte[] salt = random.generateSeed(8);
SecretKeyFactory secKeyFactory = SecretKeyFactory.getInstance("PBKDF2WithHmacSHA512");
KeySpec spec = new PBEKeySpec(password, salt, iterations, keySize);
SecretKey pbeSecretKey = secKeyFactory.generateSecret(spec);
SecretKey desSecret = new SecretKeySpec(pbeSecretKey.getEncoded(), "DESede");
// iv needs to have block size
// we will use the salt for simplification
IvParameterSpec ivParam = new IvParameterSpec(salt);
Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("DESEde/CBC/PKCS5Padding");
cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, desSecret, ivParam);
System.out.println("salt: "+Base64.getEncoder().encodeToString(salt));
System.out.println(cipher.getIV().length+" iv: "+Base64.getEncoder().encodeToString(cipher.getIV()));
byte[] ciphertext = cipher.doFinal("plaintext input".getBytes());
System.out.println("encrypted: "+Base64.getEncoder().encodeToString(ciphertext));
if you can ensure that your password has good entropy (is long and random enough) you may be good with a simple hash
MessageDigest dgst = MessageDigest.getInstance("sha-1");
byte[] hash = dgst.digest("some long, complex and random password".getBytes());
byte[] keyBytes = new byte[keySize/8];
System.arraycopy(hash, 0, keyBytes, 0, keySize/8);
SecretKey desSecret = new SecretKeySpec(keyBytes, "DESede");
The salt serves to randomize the output and should be used.
The output of the encryption should be salt | cipthertext | tag (not necessarily in this order, but you will need all of these for proper encryption).
To decrypt the output, you will need to split the output to salt, ciphertext and the tag.
I see zero vectors ( static salt or iv ) very often in examples from StackOverflow, but in many cases it may lead to broken ciphers revelaling key or plaintext.
The initialization vector iv is needed for block chain modes (encrypting longer input than a single block), we could use the salt from the key as well
when having the same size ( 8 bytes in our case). For really secure solution the password salt should be longer.
The tag is an authentication tag, to ensure that nobody has manipulated with the ciphertext. You could use HMAC of the plaintext or ciphertext. It is important you should use different key for HMAC than for encryption. However - I believe in your case your homework will be ok even without the hmac tag

Is there any difference, if I init AES cipher, with and without IvParameterSpec

I was wondering, is there any difference, if I init AES cipher, with and without IvParameterSpec?
With IvParameterSpec
SecretKeySpec skeySpec = new SecretKeySpec(key, "AES");
Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("AES/CBC/PKCS5Padding");
cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, skeySpec, new IvParameterSpec(new byte[16]));
Without IvParameterSpec
SecretKeySpec skeySpec = new SecretKeySpec(key, "AES");
Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("AES/CBC/PKCS5Padding");
cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, skeySpec);
I tested with some sample test data, their encryption and decryption result yield the same.
However, since I'm not the security expert, I don't want to miss out anything, and create a potential security loop hole. I was wondering, which is the correct way?

A bit of background (I'm sorry if you already know this, it's just worth making sure we're using the same terminology):
AES is a block cipher, an encryption algorithm that operates on 128-bit blocks.
CBC is a block cipher mode, a way of using a block cipher to encrypt large amounts of data.
Block cipher modes need an initialisation vector (IV), which is a block of initialisation data, usually the same size as the block size of the underlying cipher.
(The Wikipedia on block cipher modes - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Block_cipher_mode - is really good, and makes it clear why you need an IV.)
Different block modes impose different requirements on the IV selection process, but they all have one thing in common:
You must never encrypt two different messages with the same IV and key.
If you do, an attacker can usually get your plaintext, and sometimes your key (or equivalently useful data).
CBC imposes an additional constraint, which is that the IV must be unpredictable to an attacker - so artjom-b's suggestion of using a SecureRandom to generate it is a good one.
Additionally, as artjob-b points out, CBC only gives you confidentiality. What that means in practice is that your data is kept secret, but there's no guarantee that it arrives in one piece. Ideally, you should use an authenticated mode, such as GCM, CCM, or EAX.
Using one of these modes is a really, really good idea. Encrypt-then-MAC is unwieldy even for the experts; avoid it if you can. (If you have to do it, remember that you must use different keys for encryption and MAC.)

By default when you encrypt - your cipher will generate a random IV. You must use exactly that specific IV when you decrypt that data.
The good news is that IV is not a secret thing - you can store it in public. The main idea is to keep it different for every encrypt-decrypt operation.
Most of the times you will need to encrypt-decrypt various data and storing each IV for each piece of data is a pain.
That's why IV is often stored along with the encrypted data in a single string, as a fixed size prefix.
So that when you decrypt your string - you definitely know that first 16 bytes (in my case) are your IV, the rest of the bytes - are the encrypted data and you need to decrypt it.
Your payload (to store or send) will have the following structure:
[{IV fixed length not encrypted}{encrypted data with secret key}]
Let me share my encrypt and decrypt methods, I'm using AES, 256 bit secret key, 16 bit IV, CBC MODE and PKCS7Padding.
As Justin King-Lacroix stated above you better use GCM, CCM, or EAX block modes. Do not use ECB!
Result of encrypt() method is safe & ready to store in DB or send anywhere.
Note a comment where you can use custom IV - just replace new SecureRandom() with new IvParameterSpec(getIV()) (you can input there your static IV but this is strongly NOT recommended)
private Key secretAes256Key is a class field with a secret key, it is initialized in the constructor.
private static final String AES_TRANSFORMATION_MODE = "AES/CBC/PKCS7Padding"
the encrypt() method:
public String encrypt(String data) {
String encryptedText = "";
if (data == null || secretAes256Key == null)
return encryptedText;
}
try {
Cipher encryptCipher = Cipher.getInstance(AES_TRANSFORMATION_MODE);
encryptCipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, secretAes256Key, new SecureRandom());//new IvParameterSpec(getIV()) - if you want custom IV
//encrypted data:
byte[] encryptedBytes = encryptCipher.doFinal(data.getBytes("UTF-8"));
//take IV from this cipher
byte[] iv = encryptCipher.getIV();
//append Initiation Vector as a prefix to use it during decryption:
byte[] combinedPayload = new byte[iv.length + encryptedBytes.length];
//populate payload with prefix IV and encrypted data
System.arraycopy(iv, 0, combinedPayload, 0, iv.length);
System.arraycopy(encryptedBytes, 0, combinedPayload, iv.length, encryptedBytes.length);
encryptedText = Base64.encodeToString(combinedPayload, Base64.DEFAULT);
} catch (NoSuchAlgorithmException | BadPaddingException | NoSuchPaddingException | IllegalBlockSizeException | UnsupportedEncodingException | InvalidKeyException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
return encryptedText;
}
And here is the decrypt() method:
public String decrypt(String encryptedString) {
String decryptedText = "";
if (encryptedString == null || secretAes256Key == null)
return decryptedText;
}
try {
//separate prefix with IV from the rest of encrypted data
byte[] encryptedPayload = Base64.decode(encryptedString, Base64.DEFAULT);
byte[] iv = new byte[16];
byte[] encryptedBytes = new byte[encryptedPayload.length - iv.length];
//populate iv with bytes:
System.arraycopy(encryptedPayload, 0, iv, 0, 16);
//populate encryptedBytes with bytes:
System.arraycopy(encryptedPayload, iv.length, encryptedBytes, 0, encryptedBytes.length);
Cipher decryptCipher = Cipher.getInstance(AES_TRANSFORMATION_MODE);
decryptCipher.init(Cipher.DECRYPT_MODE, secretAes256Key, new IvParameterSpec(iv));
byte[] decryptedBytes = decryptCipher.doFinal(encryptedBytes);
decryptedText = new String(decryptedBytes);
} catch (NoSuchAlgorithmException | BadPaddingException | NoSuchPaddingException | IllegalBlockSizeException | InvalidAlgorithmParameterException | InvalidKeyException e) {
e.printStackTrace();
}
return decryptedText;
}
Hope this helps.

When no IvParameterSpec is provided then the Cipher should initialize a random IV itself, but it seems that in your case, it doesn't do this (new byte[16] is an array filled with 0x00 bytes). It seems the Cipher implementation is broken. In that case you should always provide a new random IV (necessary for semantic security).
This is usually done this way:
SecureRandom r = new SecureRandom(); // should be the best PRNG
byte[] iv = new byte[16];
r.nextBytes(iv);
cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, skeySpec, new IvParameterSpec(iv));
When you then send or store the ciphertext, you should prepend the IV to it. During decryption you only need to slice the IV off the front of the ciphertext to use it. It doesn't need to be kept secret, but it should be unique.
Note that CBC mode alone only gives you confidentiality. If any type of manipulation of ciphertexts (malicious or non-malicious) is possible then you should use an authenticated mode like GCM or EAX. Those will also give you integrity in addition to confidentiality. If you don't have access to those (SpongyCastle has them), you could use a message authentication code (MAC) in an encrypt-then-MAC scheme, but it is much harder to implement correctly.

Java crypto, reset the IV possible for performance improvement?

I create an encryption cipher as follows (in Scala, using bouncy-castle)
def encryptCipher(secret:SecretKeySpec, iv:IvParameterSpec):Cipher = {
val e = Cipher.getInstance("AES/GCM/NoPadding")
e.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, secret, iv)
}
You see that the slow operation of generating the key spec is already handled. However calling init itself for each message is too slow.
I'm currently processing 50K messages, and calling the init method adds nearly 4 seconds.
Is there a way to re-initialise with a new IV which is not so time intensive?

There's no standard way to do that in the standard library,
but there's a good workaround if you're using AES:
The purpose of the IV is to eliminate the possibility that same plain texts encrypt into the same cipher texts.
You can just "update" (as in Cipher.update(byte[])) with a random block-size byte array before encrypting (and with the same block when decrypting). This is almost exactly the same as using the same random block as IV.
To see that, run this snippet (that uses the above method to generate exactly the same cipher text - but this is just for compatibility with other platforms, there's no need to calculate a specific IV for it to be secure.
Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("AES/CBC/PKCS5Padding");
SecureRandom secureRandom = new SecureRandom();
byte[] keyBytes = new byte[16];
secureRandom.nextBytes(keyBytes);
SecretKeySpec key = new SecretKeySpec(keyBytes, "AES");
byte[] plain = new byte[256];
secureRandom.nextBytes(plain);
// first init using random IV (save it for later)
cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, key, secureRandom);
byte[] realIv = cipher.getIV();
byte[] expected = cipher.doFinal(plain);
// now init using dummy IV and encrypt with real IV prefix
IvParameterSpec nullIv = new IvParameterSpec(new byte[16]);
cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, key, nullIv);
// calculate equivalent iv
Cipher equivalentIvAsFirstBlock = Cipher.getInstance("AES/CBC/NoPadding");
equivalentIvAsFirstBlock.init(Cipher.DECRYPT_MODE, key, nullIv);
byte[] equivalentIv = equivalentIvAsFirstBlock.doFinal(realIv);
cipher.update(equivalentIv);
byte[] result = cipher.doFinal(plain);
System.out.println(Arrays.equals(expected, result));
The decryption part is easier because the result of the block-decryption is XORed with the previous cipher text (see Block cipher mode of operation), you just need to append the real IV to cipher-text, and throw it afterwards:
// Encrypt as before
IvParameterSpec nullIv = new IvParameterSpec(new byte[16]);
cipher.init(Cipher.DECRYPT_MODE, key, nullIv);
cipher.update(realIv);
byte[] result = cipher.doFinal(encrypted);
// result.length == plain.length + 16
// just throw away the first block

Does AES/CBC really require IV parameter?

I am writing a simple app to encrypt my message using AES / CBC (mode). As my understanding CBC mode requires IV parameter but I don't know why my code work without IV parameter used. Anyone can explain why? Thanks.
The encrypted message printed: T9KdWxVZ5xStaisXn6llfg== without exception.
public class TestAES {
public static void main(String[] args) {
try {
byte[] salt = new byte[8];
new SecureRandom().nextBytes(salt);
SecretKeyFactory keyFactory = SecretKeyFactory.getInstance("PBKDF2WithHmacSHA1");
KeySpec keySpec = new PBEKeySpec("myPassword".toCharArray(), salt, 100, 128);
SecretKey tmp = keyFactory.generateSecret(keySpec);
SecretKeySpec key = new SecretKeySpec(tmp.getEncoded(), "AES");
Cipher enCipher = Cipher.getInstance("AES/CBC/PKCS5Padding");
enCipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, key);
// enCipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, key, new IvParameterSpec(iv));
byte[] cipherBytes = enCipher.doFinal("myMessage".getBytes());
String cipherMsg = BaseEncoding.base64().encode(cipherBytes);
System.out.println("Encrypted message: " + cipherMsg);
} catch (Exception ex) {
ex.printStackTrace();
}
}
}

When it is used without an IV, for certain types of ciphers including AES, it implicitly uses 0 IV. See Cipher class documentation.
The disadvantage of a null IV (or a deterministic IV) is that it is vulnerable to dictionary attacks. The requirement for IV is to prevent the same plain text block producing the same cipher text every time.

Like other users have said, it depends on the JCE provider. Java SE generates a random IV for you if you specify none.
Only Android1 and Javacard API use a blank IV, which is non-conforming to the Java Crypto spec, which states:
If this cipher requires any algorithm parameters that cannot be derived from the given key, the underlying cipher implementation is supposed to generate the required parameters itself (using provider-specific default or random values) if it is being initialized for encryption or key wrapping, and raise an InvalidKeyException if it is being initialized for decryption or key unwrapping. The generated parameters can be retrieved using getParameters or getIV (if the parameter is an IV).
If you do not specify the IV, in Java SE you get a random one, and will need to retrieve it with cipher.getIV() and store it, as it will be needed for decryption.
But better yet, generate a random IV yourself and provide it via IvParameterSpec.
Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("AES/CBC/PKCS5Padding");
SecureRandom rnd = new SecureRandom();
byte[] iv = new byte[cipher.getBlockSize()];
rnd.nextBytes(iv);
IvParameterSpec ivParams = new IvParameterSpec(iv);
cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, new SecretKeySpec(key, "AES"), ivParams);
byte[] ciphertext = cipher.doFinal(input.getBytes());
1 That could be because Android is Java-esque, like the Eminem-esque ad. Just guessing, that's all.

what is wrong in java AES decrypt function?

i modified the code available on
http://java.sun.com/developer/technicalArticles/Security/AES/AES_v1.html
and made encrypt and decrypt methods in program. but i am getting BadpaddingException..
also the function is returning null..
why it is happing?? whats going wrong? please help me..
these are variables i am using:
kgen = KeyGenerator.getInstance("AES");
kgen.init(128);
raw = new byte[]{(byte)0x00,(byte)0x11,(byte)0x22,(byte)0x33,(byte)0x44,(byte)0x55,(byte)0x66,(byte)0x77,(byte)0x88,(byte)0x99,(byte)0xaa,(byte)0xbb,(byte)0xcc,(byte)0xdd,(byte)0xee,(byte)0xff};
skeySpec = new SecretKeySpec(raw, "AES");
cipher = Cipher.getInstance("AES");
plainText=null;
cipherText=null;
following is decrypt function..
public String decrypt(String cipherText)
{
try
{
cipher.init(Cipher.DECRYPT_MODE, skeySpec);
byte[] original = cipher.doFinal(cipherText.getBytes());
plainText = new String(original);
}
catch(BadPaddingException e)
{
}
return plainText;
}

From the Java-Security archives
One common mistakes that people made is to put the encrypted bytes inside a
string and upon decryption they use String.getBytes() to retrieve it.
Since String does its own character encoding, the byte[] that you used to
construct the String object and the byte[] that you get from its getBytes()
are not necessarily equal.

Where is cipherText actually coming from? It needs to be a "raw" byte array (not a string), and needs to have been encrypted in a way that the Cipher can understand.
AES (and block ciphers in general) can be run in different "block modes" and with different "padding", and when you instantiate a Cipher, you should indicate which block mode you're using (or which was used to originally encrypt the data). If you get a BadPaddingException when passing in raw bytes, then it generally means the data has been encrypted using a different mode or padding. (In this case, it could just be an artefact of converting the data to a String, as I think another poster has mentioned.)
Some information I've written that might be helpful:
AES and block ciphers in Java
block modes

Since you've shown very little code it's hard to help predict what might be causing the exception.
plainText is null because it is initialized to null and the decrypt function is throwing an exception before assigning a value to plainText.
What do you do with kgen? In the example you linked to it is used to generate the raw byte array for the secret key spec. In your variable instantiation list you manually define the raw byte array.
KeyGenerator kgen = KeyGenerator.getInstance("AES");
kgen.init(128); // 192 and 256 bits may not be available
// Generate the secret key specs.
SecretKey skey = kgen.generateKey();
byte[] raw = skey.getEncoded();
SecretKeySpec skeySpec = new SecretKeySpec(raw, "AES");