SoftHSM2: What crypto mechanisms and ciphers are supported?

SoftHSM2 is free and easy o install or compile. But if you search how to use SoftHSM2 for symmetric and asymmetric cryptography or hashing you will notice that the OpenDNSSEC Wiki will not have any hint what mechanisms are supportet. This post will show how to view all SoftHSM mechanisms using pkcs11-tool. This references are based on version 2.6.1 and can be downloaded from OpenDNSSEC website.

To repeat the following steps you need to install or compile the following packages:

  • OpenSC (includes pkcs11-tool binary)
  • SoftHSM2

List all SoftHSM2 mechanisms (AES, DES, DH, DSA, ECDH, ECDSA, HASHES, RSA)

SoftHSM2: What crypto mechanisms and ciphers are supported? weiterlesen

SoftHSM2 view slot info and objects on a specific slot

Whenever you need to work with SoftHSM2 there is a need to view all your configured slots and the objects saved on these slots. As softhsm2-util is not very well documented I decided to support the cryptographic community by offering working usage examples of the main tool of SoftHSM2. This post will show how to view all SoftHSM slots and examine all objects on a specific SoftHSM slots. This working examples are based on version 2.6.1 and can be downloaded from OpenDNSSEC website.

List all SoftHSM2 slots

After installation of SoftHSM2 and once you created a few slots you can check your slot configuration with softhsm2-util and its option “–show-slots”

SoftHSM2 view slot info and objects on a specific slot weiterlesen

SoftHSM2 first steps to create slots

As softhsm2-util is not very well documented I decided to support the cryptographic community by offering working usage examples of the main tool of SoftHSM2. This post will show how to initialize a SoftHSM slot and to view your SoftHSM slots. This working examples are based on version 2.6.1 and can be downloaded from OpenDNSSEC website.

After installation of SoftHSM2 you can check your slot configuration with option –show-slots

$ softhsm2-util --show-slots
SoftHSM2 first steps to create slots weiterlesen