Encrypt a string with Java for decryption using PHP

Question

I am writing a program using Java 1.6 that should generate a message of the format:

"Your invoice #123 for 100.00 is at https://my.site.com/documents/invoice?p=xxxxxxxxxxx"

with xxxxx containing an encrypted JSON string. The website at my.site.com runs PHP. It would open the URL with the invoice info:

<?php
$cipher = "AES-128-CTR";
$encryption_iv = "1234567891011121";
$encryption_key = "MyPassword";
$encryption_options = 0;
$enrypted_parm = urldecode( $this->input->get('p') );
$iv_length = openssl_cipher_iv_length( $cipher );
$decrypted_parm = openssl_decrypt( $enrypted_parm, $cipher, $encryption_key, $encryption_options, $encryption_iv );
$parms = json_decode($decrypted_parm);

echo "id=" . $parms->id . "&db=" . $parms->db . "&archived=" . $parms->archived;
?>

To generate the message from Java, I have tried this:

encryption_key = "MyPassword";
JsonObject joParms = new JsonObject();
joParms.addProperty("id", invoiceId);
joParms.addProperty("db", db);
joParms.addProperty("archived", isArchive);

SecretKeySpec secretKeySpec = new SecretKeySpec(encryption_key.concat("           ").substring(0,16).getBytes(), "AES");
Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("AES");
cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, secretKeySpec);
byte[] byteEncryptedString = cipher.doFinal(joParms.toString().getBytes());
String encodedString = Base64.encodeBase64String(byteEncryptedString);

String message = messageTemplate.replace("{INVNO}", invNo).replace("{AMOUNT}", amount).concat(" ").concat(siteUrl).concat("?p=").concat(encodedString);

The encrypted string generated thus does not get decrypted by PHP. I think the two don't quite match in specs. Can someone help?

You have to specify mode and padding on the Java side in getInstance(), e.g. "AES/CTR/NoPadding", otherwise (platform-dependent) default values will be used. — Topaco
– Topaco, Commented Jan 1 at 13:56
I was just going to suggest trying this as well, trying to use a more specific encryption mode. — Hovercraft Full Of Eels
– Hovercraft Full Of Eels, Commented Jan 1 at 13:59
Also missing in the Java code is the determination of the automatically generated IV with cipher.getIV() (or the specification of a user-defined IV for encryption) as well as a padding of the key that is compatible with the PHP code (with 0x00 values). — Topaco
– Topaco, Commented Jan 1 at 14:25
@user2023577 We have to play the hand we're dealt. In this case, this is a major system used by the government. So, it's not up to me to change it. — Hussain Akbar
– Hussain Akbar, Commented Jan 1 at 17:01
You must pass the IV as IvParameterSpec instance in the third parameter of cipher.init(). — Topaco
– Topaco, Commented Jan 1 at 17:06

Topaco · Accepted Answer · 2025-01-01 21:27:31Z

For compatibility with the PHP code, in the Java code:

mode and padding must be specified. Otherwise, platform-dependent default values are used.
the IV must be passed with IvParameterSpec (or if no user-defined IV is applied, the automatically generated IV must be retrieved with cipher.getIV(), as this is required for decryption).
for AES-128 a too short key must be padded with 0x00 values to 16 bytes and a too long key must be truncated after 16 bytes (as PHP/OpenSSL does).
a URL encoding must be carried out, since in the PHP code a URL decoding is done.

In addition, for security reasons:

an encoding should be specified in getBytes(). Otherwise, a platform-dependent default encoding is used (at least in earlier Java versions).
no static IV should be applied, but a randomly generated IV for each encryption, which is passed along with the ciphertext (usually concatenated). Note that the IV is not a secret.
no password/text should be used directly as key. Instead, a key derivation function (like e.g. PBKDF2) should be applied in conjunction with a random salt.
a supported Java version should be used whenever possible.

Sample code for Java 1.6:

import java.net.URLEncoder;
import java.util.Arrays;
import javax.crypto.Cipher;
import javax.crypto.spec.IvParameterSpec;
import javax.crypto.spec.SecretKeySpec;
import org.apache.commons.codec.binary.Base64;

...

String encryption_key = "MyPa§sword";
String iv = "1234567891011121"; 
String plaintext = "{\"key1\":\"value1\",\"key2\":\"value2\"}"; // some JSON string
String utf8 = "UTF8";

SecretKeySpec secretKeySpec = new SecretKeySpec(Arrays.copyOf(encryption_key.getBytes(utf8), 16), "AES"); // pad/truncate key 
Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("AES/CTR/NoPadding"); // specify mode and padding 
cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, secretKeySpec, new IvParameterSpec(iv.getBytes(utf8))); // specify IV
byte[] byteEncryptedString = cipher.doFinal(plaintext.getBytes(utf8));
String encodedString = URLEncoder.encode(Base64.encodeBase64String(byteEncryptedString), utf8); // add Url encoding

System.out.println(encodedString); // JxTY7z6mhpSTP46W0bkoJ%2BfDes0%2Fts7HWK5BBlwjTLZH

which can be decrypted with the following PHP code:

<?php
$ciphertext = "JxTY7z6mhpSTP46W0bkoJ%2BfDes0%2Fts7HWK5BBlwjTLZH";
$cipher = "AES-128-CTR";
$encryption_iv = "1234567891011121";
$encryption_key = "MyPa§sword";
$encryption_options = 0;
$enrypted_parm = urldecode($ciphertext);
$iv_length = openssl_cipher_iv_length( $cipher );
$decrypted_parm = openssl_decrypt( $enrypted_parm, $cipher, $encryption_key, $encryption_options, $encryption_iv );
$parms = json_decode($decrypted_parm);
print_r($parms); /* stdClass Object
                    (
                        [key1] => value1
                        [key2] => value2
                    )
                 */
?>

Amol · Accepted Answer · 2025-01-02 11:16:02Z

One common approach is using AES encryption with a shared secret key. Below is an example (Ecnrypt Java):

import javax.crypto.Cipher; import javax.crypto.KeyGenerator;
import javax.crypto.SecretKey;
import javax.crypto.spec.SecretKeySpec;
import java.util.Base64;

public class Encryptor {
private static final String ALGORITHM = "AES";

public static String encrypt(String data, String key) throws Exception {
    SecretKeySpec secretKey = new SecretKeySpec(key.getBytes(), ALGORITHM);
    Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance(ALGORITHM);
    cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, secretKey);
    byte[] encryptedData = cipher.doFinal(data.getBytes());
    return Base64.getEncoder().encodeToString(encryptedData);
}

public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {
    String originalString = "Hello, PHP!";
    String key = "1234567890123456"; // 16-byte key (128-bit)
    
    String encryptedString = encrypt(originalString, key);
    System.out.println("Encrypted: " + encryptedString);
}
}

Decrypt PHP example :

    <?php
function decrypt($encrypted, $key) {
    $cipher = "aes-128-ecb"; // Must match the Java AES mode
    $decoded = base64_decode($encrypted);
    $decrypted = openssl_decrypt($decoded, $cipher, $key, OPENSSL_RAW_DATA);
    return $decrypted;
}

$encryptedString = "EncryptedStringFromJava"; // Replace with actual encrypted string
$key = "1234567890123456"; // 16-byte key (same as used in Java)

$decryptedString = decrypt($encryptedString, $key);
echo "Decrypted: " . $decryptedString;
?>

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