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Keys Config

Tessera uses cryptographic keys to provide transaction privacy.

You can use existing private/public key pairs as well as use Tessera to generate new key pairs for you. See Generating & securing keys for more info. 

"keys": {
    "passwords": [],
    "passwordFile": "Path",
    "azureKeyVaultConfig": {
        "url": "Url"
    },
    "hashicorpKeyVaultConfig": {
        "url": "Url",
        "approlePath": "String",
        "tlsKeyStorePath": "Path",
        "tlsTrustStorePath": "Path" 
    },
    "keyData": [
        {
            // The data for a private/public key pair
        }
    ]
}

KeyData

Key pairs can be provided in several ways:

Direct key pairs

Warning

Direct key pairs and unprotected inline key pairs are convenient but are the least secure configuration options available as the private key is exposed in the configuration file. The other options available are more secure and recommended for production environments.

The key pair data is provided in plain text in the configfile.

"keys": {
    "keyData": [
        {
        "privateKey": "yAWAJjwPqUtNVlqGjSrBmr1/iIkghuOh1803Yzx9jLM=",
        "publicKey": "/+UuD63zItL1EbjxkKUljMgG8Z1w0AJ8pNOR4iq2yQc="
        }
    ]
}

Inline key pairs

Unprotected

Warning

Direct key pairs and unprotected inline key pairs are convenient but are the least secure configuration options available as the private key is exposed in the configuration file. The other options available are more secure and recommended for production environments.

The key pair data is provided in plain text in the configfile. The plain text private key is provided in a config json object: 

"keys": {
    "keyData": [
        {
            "config": {
                "data": {
                    "bytes": "yAWAJjwPqUtNVlqGjSrBmr1/iIkghuOh1803Yzx9jLM="
                },
                "type": "unlocked"
            },
            "publicKey": "/+UuD63zItL1EbjxkKUljMgG8Z1w0AJ8pNOR4iq2yQc="
        }
    ]
}

Protected

The public key is provided in plain text. The private key must be password-protected using Argon2. The corresponding encrypted data is provided in the config json object.

"keys": {
    "passwords": ["password"],
    "passwordFile": "/path/to/pwds.txt",
    "keyData": [
        {
            "config": {
                "data": {
                    "aopts": {
                        "variant": "id",
                        "memory": 1048576,
                        "iterations": 10,
                        "parallelism": 4,
                    },
                    "snonce": "x3HUNXH6LQldKtEv3q0h0hR4S12Ur9pC",
                    "asalt": "7Sem2tc6fjEfW3yYUDN/kSslKEW0e1zqKnBCWbZu2Zw=",
                    "sbox": "d0CmRus0rP0bdc7P7d/wnOyEW14pwFJmcLbdu2W3HmDNRWVJtoNpHrauA/Sr5Vxc"
                },
                "type": "argon2sbox"
            },
            "publicKey": "/+UuD63zItL1EbjxkKUljMgG8Z1w0AJ8pNOR4iq2yQc="
        }
    ]
}

Passwords must be provided so that Tessera can decrypt and use the private keys. Passwords can be provided in multiple ways:

Description
File "passwordFile": "/path/to/pwds.txt"
Must contain only one password per line. Empty lines should be used for unlocked keys. Passwords must be provided in the order that key pairs are defined in the config.
Direct "passwords": ["pwd1", "pwd2", ...]
Empty strings should be used for unlocked keys. Passwords must be provided in the order that key pairs are defined in the config. Not recommended for production use.
CLI Tessera will prompt on the CLI for the passwords of any encrypted keys that have not had passwords provided in the config. This process only needs to be performed once, when starting the node.

Filesystem key pairs

The keys in the pair are stored in files: 

"keys": {
    "passwords": ["password"],
    "passwordFile": "/path/to/pwds.txt",
    "keyData": [
        {
            "privateKeyPath": "/path/to/privateKey.key",
            "publicKeyPath": "/path/to/publicKey.pub"
        }
    ]
}
The contents of the public key file must contain the public key only, e.g.: 
/+UuD63zItL1EbjxkKUljMgG8Z1w0AJ8pNOR4iq2yQc=

The contents of the private key file must contain the private key in the Inline key pair format, e.g.: 

{
    "type" : "unlocked",
    "data" : {
        "bytes" : "DK0HDgMWJKtZVaP31mPhk6TJNACfVzz7VZv2PsQZeKM="
    }
}

or

{
    "data": {
        "aopts": {
            "variant": "id",
            "memory": 1048576,
            "iterations": 10,
            "parallelism": 4,
        },
        "snonce": "x3HUNXH6LQldKtEv3q0h0hR4S12Ur9pC",
        "asalt": "7Sem2tc6fjEfW3yYUDN/kSslKEW0e1zqKnBCWbZu2Zw=",
        "sbox": "d0CmRus0rP0bdc7P7d/wnOyEW14pwFJmcLbdu2W3HmDNRWVJtoNpHrauA/Sr5Vxc"
    },
    "type": "argon2sbox"
}

Passwords must be provided so that Tessera can decrypt and use the private keys. Passwords can be provided in multiple ways:

Description
File "passwordFile": "/path/to/pwds.txt"
Must contain only one password per line. Empty lines should be used for unlocked keys. Passwords must be provided in the order that key pairs are defined in the config.
Direct "passwords": ["pwd1", "pwd2", ...]
Empty strings should be used for unlocked keys. Passwords must be provided in the order that key pairs are defined in the config. Not recommended for production use.
CLI Tessera will prompt on the CLI for the passwords of any encrypted keys that have not had passwords provided in the config. This process only needs to be performed once, when starting the node.

Azure Key Vault key pairs

The keys in the pair are stored as secrets in an Azure Key Vault. This requires providing the vault url and the secret IDs for both keys: 

"keys": {
    "azureKeyVaultConfig": {
        "url": "https://my-vault.vault.azure.net"
    },
    "keyData": [
        {
            "azureVaultPrivateKeyId": "Key",
            "azureVaultPublicKeyId": "Pub",
            "azureVaultPublicKeyVersion": "bvfw05z4cbu11ra2g94e43v9xxewqdq7",
            "azureVaultPrivateKeyVersion": "0my1ora2dciijx5jq9gv07sauzs5wjo2"
        }
    ]
}

This example configuration will retrieve the specified versions of the secrets Key and Pub from the key vault with DNS name https://my-vault.vault.azure.net. If no version is specified then the latest version of the secret is retrieved.

Info

Environment variables must be set if using an Azure Key Vault, for more information see Setting up an Azure Key Vault

Hashicorp Vault key pairs

The keys in the pair are stored as a secret in a Hashicorp Vault. Additional configuration can also be provided if the Vault is configured to use TLS and if the AppRole auth method is being used at a different path to the default (approle): 

"hashicorpKeyVaultConfig": {
    "url": "https://localhost:8200",
    "tlsKeyStorePath": "/path/to/keystore.jks",
    "tlsTrustStorePath": "/path/to/truststore.jks",
    "approlePath": "not-default",
},
"keyData": [
    {
        "hashicorpVaultSecretEngineName": "engine",
        "hashicorpVaultSecretName": "secret",
        "hashicorpVaultSecretVersion": 1,
        "hashicorpVaultPrivateKeyId": "privateKey",
        "hashicorpVaultPublicKeyId": "publicKey",
    }
]

This example configuration will retrieve version 1 of the secret engine/secret from Vault and its corresponding values for privateKey and publicKey.

If no hashicorpVaultSecretVersion is provided then the latest version for the secret will be retrieved by default.

Tessera requires TLS certificates and keys to be stored in .jks Java keystore format. If the .jks files are password protected then the following environment variables must be set:

  • HASHICORP_CLIENT_KEYSTORE_PWD
  • HASHICORP_CLIENT_TRUSTSTORE_PWD

Info

If using a Hashicorp Vault additional environment variables must be set and a version 2 K/V secret engine must be enabled. For more information see Setting up a Hashicorp Vault.

Multiple Keys

If wished, multiple key pairs can be specified for a Tessera node. In this case, any one of the public keys can be used to address a private transaction to that node. Tessera will sequentially try each key to find one that can decrypt the payload. This can be used, for example, to simplify key rotation.

Note that multiple key pairs can only be set up within the configuration file, not via separate filesystem key files.

Viewing the keys registered for a node

An ADMIN API endpoint /config/keypairs exists to allow you to view the public keys of the key pairs currently in use by your Tessera node. This requires configuring an ADMIN server in the node’s configuration file, as described in Configuration Overview.

A sample response for the request adminhost:port/config/keypairs is: 

[
   {
      "publicKey" : "oNspPPgszVUFw0qmGFfWwh1uxVUXgvBxleXORHj07g8="
   },
   {
      "publicKey" : "ABn6zhBth2qpdrJXp98IvjExV212ALl3j4U//nj4FAI="
   }
]