install X509 certificate programmatically in my case

Question

I am developing an Android project. I have a PEM certificate string:

-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----
MIIEczCCA1ugAwIBAgIBADANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQQFAD..AkGA1UEBhMCR0Ix
EzARBgNVBAgTClNvbWUtU3RhdGUxFDASBgNVBAoTC0..0EgTHRkMTcwNQYD
VQQLEy5DbGFzcyAxIFB1YmxpYyBQcmltYXJ5IENlcn..XRpb24gQXV0aG9y
...MANY LINES...
It8una2gY4l2O//on88r5IWJlm1L0oA8e4fR2yrBHX..adsGeFKkyNrwGi/
7vQMfXdGsRrXNGRGnX+vWDZ3/zWI0joDtCkNnqEpVn..HoX
-----END CERTIFICATE-----

(I assigned above certificate string to a variable named CERT_STR)

I convert above PEM string to X509Certificate by:

byte[] certBytes = CERT_STR.getBytes();
CertificateFactory certificateFactory = CertificateFactory.getInstance("X.509");
InputStream certIs = new ByteArrayInputStream(certBytes); 
// now I get the X509 certificate from the PEM string
X509Certificate certificate = (X509Certificate) certificateFactory.generateCertificate(certIs);

Then, I try to install the certificate programmatically by:

Intent intent = KeyChain.createInstallIntent();
// because my PEM only contains a certificate, no private key, so I use EXTRA_CERTIFICATE
intent.putExtra(KeyChain.EXTRA_CERTIFICATE, certificate.getEncoded());
intent.addFlags(Intent.FLAG_ACTIVITY_NEW_TASK);
context.startActivity(intent);

When I run my app, I see system dialog pops up saying "Extracting..." , I know system is extracting my certificate, but that dialog is showing there all the time saying "Extracting...".

Why? Where am I wrong in my code to install the certificate?

Answer 1

You are probably not using properly created X509 certificate. Following worked on my end and I did not see any "Extracting..." dialog (Nexus 5X, Android 7.0):

String x509cert = "-----BEGIN CERTIFICATE-----\n" +
        "MIICrjCCAhegAwIBAgIJAO9T3E+oW38mMA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBCwUAMHAxCzAJBgNV\n" +
        "BAYTAlVaMREwDwYDVQQHDAhUYXNoa2VudDENMAsGA1UECgwERWZpcjEQMA4GA1UE\n" +
        "CwwHSVQgZGVwdDEQMA4GA1UEAwwHZWZpci51ejEbMBkGCSqGSIb3DQEJARYMaG9z\n" +
        "dEBlZmlyLnV6MB4XDTE2MTExMDA4MjIzMFoXDTE2MTIxMDA4MjIzMFowcDELMAkG\n" +
        "A1UEBhMCVVoxETAPBgNVBAcMCFRhc2hrZW50MQ0wCwYDVQQKDARFZmlyMRAwDgYD\n" +
        "VQQLDAdJVCBkZXB0MRAwDgYDVQQDDAdlZmlyLnV6MRswGQYJKoZIhvcNAQkBFgxo\n" +
        "b3N0QGVmaXIudXowgZ8wDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQADgY0AMIGJAoGBAL60mG0Gpl7s\n" +
        "3qMnZcURB1xk5Qen6FN0+AJB5Z/WHA50n1MUkXNY28rkEYupkxpfEqR+/gXgBUAm\n" +
        "FACA3GSdoHMMY1kdeAzxsYbBEbtGKHICF/QFGTqScWmI6uBUwzsLDLv1ELef/zEY\n" +
        "Ru/krXtNh8ZNYyfwVKyZaB9+3M2yOqATAgMBAAGjUDBOMB0GA1UdDgQWBBS1nH3O\n" +
        "ecLDrIZLZ/f1WsNL/xtuEzAfBgNVHSMEGDAWgBS1nH3OecLDrIZLZ/f1WsNL/xtu\n" +
        "EzAMBgNVHRMEBTADAQH/MA0GCSqGSIb3DQEBCwUAA4GBAGzjJnXODvF9UHBKHAUF\n" +
        "kzisr78Og5BrKyAgdnjH196Jg4MO7RNJdQAmuAIk9aBB/jvAiznhhbcD3mYImH+h\n" +
        "F0Scewk5m736ydGhkcUpmxA5ye1hajjs9V7PQD2O4a8rNJSlJjiWRWSqxTfH79Ns\n" +
        "B7x2HND9LU/iz02ugGJ8vwg8\n" +
        "-----END CERTIFICATE-----\n";
Intent intent = KeyChain.createInstallIntent();
intent.putExtra(KeyChain.EXTRA_CERTIFICATE, x509cert.getBytes());
startActivity(intent);

To generate the above certificate, I used the following steps (based on Generating Keys and Certificates for SSO):

$ openssl genrsa -out rsaprivkey.pem 1024

$ openssl req -new -x509 -key rsaprivkey.pem -out rsacert.pem

$ ls
rsacert.pem rsaprivkey.pem

Then I simply copy/pasted the output from cat rsacert.pem to x509cert.

Hope this helps.