Enabling stronger encryption

IBM® provides Java™ Cryptography Extension (JCE) unlimited jurisdiction policy files that allow the use of stronger (longer) key sizes for Java encryption. If you want to create a custom encryption provider using these stronger key sizes, download and install the IBM unlimited jurisdiction policy files using the following steps.

About this task

These Java JCE unlimited jurisdiction policy files contain keys that are longer than 128 bits. You can find more information about the encryption algorithms, key sizes, and restrictions of the IBM JRE and these policy files in Java Cryptography Extension (JCE).

Procedure

  1. From the Security information page, click the IBM SDK Policy files link.
  2. Log in with your IBM user ID and password.
  3. Select Unrestricted JCE Policy files for Java 5.0 SR16, Java 6 SR13, Java 7 SR4 and later versions and click Continue.
  4. Select Unrestricted JCE Policy files and click Continue.
  5. If you accept the license, download unrestrict142.zip and extract the local_policy.jar and US_export_policy.jar files.
  6. Save these two files to the IS_install_path/jdk/jre/lib/security directory and IS_install_path/jdk/jre/lib/security directories, and replace the existing files of the same names.
  7. Restart the JRE for the new policy to be effective.

What to do next

Create and add a custom implementation of the EncryptionProvider interface that uses these policy files.