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Failed to parse the private key file of Ed25519! #1238
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Usually this would mean the password is wrong, it's possibly an issue with the PBE algorithm, but given how long it has been since we have had a report like this, I'd check the password.
Usually this would mean the password is wrong, it's possibly an issue with the PBE algorithm, but given how long it has been since we have had a report like this, I'd check the password.
I don't think it was the wrong password that caused the problem；The exception occurs when this line of code is executed：Object o = pemParser.readObject(); When I parse private key files generated by other algorithms (RSA/EC) in the same way, it's OK; I think the class (PEMParser ) does not support parsing the ed25519 private key encrypted in the preceding format;
It should decrypt to a private key object, as in a PKCS#8 PrivateKeyInfo. If there was an issue with the fact it was ed25519 then the problem would show up trying to interpret the contents of the PrivateKeyInfo
@dghgit It's not an ENCRYPTED PRIVATE KEY, it's a PRIVATE KEY using PEM encryption. While KeyPairParser supports the PEM encryption (returning a PEMEncryptedKeyPair), PrivateKeyParser doesn't have a pathway to e.g. a "PEMEncryptedPrivateKey".
Oh yeah... think it must be a slow day today. Let me think about this further. @chen0411 would you provide a sample with a password.
Yes, password is: Vjvyhfngz0MCUs$kwOF0
private key:-----BEGIN PRIVATE KEY-----
Proc-Type: 4,ENCRYPTED
DEK-Info: AES-128-CBC,b619a06a16b7b7a6436579f06a14f45eQmysBFzoMkgvVTM39kvHjkKhcBjK6PVMZ6a/taF44ZXeOl3t5DUp4EWxyfs8htng
tjsKIb0yKJigIZGrCeHROQ==
-----END PRIVATE KEY-----and can use openssl command to change the private key to ENCRYPTED PRIVATE KEY.
for example:
I think this is an example of what I was describing in #1350 - this is a PKCS8 PrivateKeyInfo encrypted with the 'traditional' PEM method.
It looks like openssl can read such keys (although I've yet to find a way to get it to generate them), but BC just sees it as an unencrypted PKCS8 key, and the subsequent error messages are it trying to parse the random data as a PrivateKeyInfo.@chen0411 - was the original encrypted key generated by BC or something else?
This is now fixed and on https://www.bouncycastle.org/betas
- added a commit that references this issue
on May 3, 2026
try to parser the private key file of ed25519, and fail , how to fix it ?
-----BEGIN PRIVATE KEY-----
Proc-Type: 4,ENCRYPTED
DEK-Info: AES-128-CBC,b619a06a16b7b7a6436579f06a14f45e
QmysBFzoMkgvVTM39kvHjkKhcBjK6PVMZ6a/taF44ZXeOl3t5DUp4EWxyfs8htng
tjsKIb0yKJigIZGrCeHROQ==
-----END PRIVATE KEY-----
exception info:
org.bouncycastle.openssl.PEMException: problem parsing PRIVATE KEY: java.lang.IllegalArgumentException: failed to construct sequence from byte[]: corrupted stream - out of bounds length found: 108 >= 64
at org.bouncycastle.openssl.PEMParser$PrivateKeyParser.parseObject(Unknown Source)
at org.bouncycastle.openssl.PEMParser.readObject(Unknown Source)
....
core code:
` PrivateKeyInfo pki;
try (PEMParser pemParser = new PEMParser(new StringReader(encryptPrivateKey))) {
Object o = pemParser.readObject();
if (o instanceof PKCS8EncryptedPrivateKeyInfo) {
PKCS8EncryptedPrivateKeyInfo epki = (PKCS8EncryptedPrivateKeyInfo) o;
JcePKCSPBEInputDecryptorProviderBuilder builder
= new JcePKCSPBEInputDecryptorProviderBuilder().setProvider("BC");
InputDecryptorProvider idp = builder.build(password.toCharArray());
pki = epki.decryptPrivateKeyInfo(idp);