openssl-cms - CMS command
openssl cms [-help]
General options:
[-in filename] [-out filename]
[-config configfile]
Operation options:
[-encrypt] [-decrypt] [-sign]
[-verify] [-resign] [-sign_receipt]
[-verify_receipt receipt] [-digest_create]
[-digest_verify] [-compress] [-uncompress]
[-EncryptedData_encrypt] [-EncryptedData_decrypt]
[-data_create] [-data_out] [-cmsout]
File format options:
[-inform DER|PEM|SMIME]
[-outform DER|PEM|SMIME] [-rctform
DER|PEM|SMIME] [-stream] [-indef]
[-noindef] [-binary] [-crlfeol] [-asciicrlf]
Keys and password options:
[-pwri_password password] [-secretkey
key] [-secretkeyid id] [-inkey
filename|uri] [-passin arg] [-keyopt
name:parameter] [-keyform
DER|PEM|P12|ENGINE] [-engine id]
[-provider name] [-provider-path path]
[-propquery propq] [-rand files]
[-writerand file]
Encryption options:
[-originator file] [-recip file]
[recipient-cert ...] [-cipher]
[-wrap cipher] [-aes128-wrap] [-aes192-wrap]
[-aes256-wrap] [-des3-wrap] [-debug_decrypt]
Signing options:
[-md digest] [-signer file]
[-certfile file] [-cades] [-nodetach]
[-nocerts] [-noattr] [-nosmimecap]
[-receipt_request_all] [-receipt_request_first]
[-receipt_request_from emailaddress]
[-receipt_request_to emailaddress]
Verification options:
[-signer file] [-content filename]
[-no_content_verify] [-no_attr_verify] [-nosigs]
[-noverify] [-nointern] [-cades]
[-verify_retcode] [-CAfile file] [-no-CAfile]
[-CApath dir] [-no-CApath] [-CAstore uri]
[-no-CAstore]
Output options:
[-keyid] [-econtent_type type] [-text]
[-certsout file] [-to addr] [-from
addr] [-subject subj]
Printing options:
[-noout] [-print] [-nameopt option]
[-receipt_request_print]
Validation options:
[-allow_proxy_certs] [-attime timestamp]
[-no_check_time] [-check_ss_sig] [-crl_check]
[-crl_check_all] [-explicit_policy] [-extended_crl]
[-ignore_critical] [-inhibit_any] [-inhibit_map]
[-partial_chain] [-policy arg] [-policy_check]
[-policy_print] [-purpose purpose] [-suiteB_128]
[-suiteB_128_only] [-suiteB_192] [-trusted_first]
[-no_alt_chains] [-use_deltas] [-auth_level num]
[-verify_depth num] [-verify_email email]
[-verify_hostname hostname] [-verify_ip ip]
[-verify_name name] [-x509_strict]
[-issuer_checks]
This command handles data in CMS format such as S/MIME v3.1 email messages. It
can encrypt, decrypt, sign, verify, compress, uncompress, and print messages.
There are a number of operation options that set the type of operation to be
performed: encrypt, decrypt, sign, verify, resign, sign_receipt,
verify_receipt, digest_create, digest_verify, compress, uncompress,
EncryptedData_encrypt, EncryptedData_decrypt, data_create, data_out, or
cmsout. The relevance of the other options depends on the operation type and
their meaning may vary according to it.
- -help
- Print out a usage message.
- -in filename
- The input message to be encrypted or signed or the message to be decrypted
or verified.
- -out filename
- The message text that has been decrypted or verified or the output MIME
format message that has been signed or verified.
- -config configfile
- See "Configuration Option" in openssl(1).
- -encrypt
- Encrypt data for the given recipient certificates. Input file is the
message to be encrypted. The output file is the encrypted data in MIME
format. The actual CMS type is EnvelopedData.
Note that no revocation check is done for the recipient cert,
so if that key has been compromised, others may be able to decrypt the
text.
- -decrypt
- Decrypt data using the supplied certificate and private key. Expects
encrypted datain MIME format for the input file. The decrypted data is
written to the output file.
- -sign
- Sign data using the supplied certificate and private key. Input file is
the message to be signed. The signed data in MIME format is written to the
output file.
- -verify
- Verify signed data. Expects a signed data on input and outputs the signed
data. Both clear text and opaque signing is supported.
- -resign
- Resign a message: take an existing message and one or more new
signers.
- -sign_receipt
- Generate and output a signed receipt for the supplied message. The input
message must contain a signed receipt request. Functionality is
otherwise similar to the -sign operation.
- -verify_receipt receipt
- Verify a signed receipt in filename receipt. The input message
must contain the original receipt request. Functionality is
otherwise similar to the -verify operation.
- -digest_create
- Create a CMS DigestedData type.
- -digest_verify
- Verify a CMS DigestedData type and output the content.
- -compress
- Create a CMS CompressedData type. OpenSSL must be compiled with
zlib support for this option to work, otherwise it will output an
error.
- -uncompress
- Uncompress a CMS CompressedData type and output the content.
OpenSSL must be compiled with zlib support for this option to work,
otherwise it will output an error.
- -EncryptedData_encrypt
- Encrypt content using supplied symmetric key and algorithm using a CMS
EncryptedData type and output the content.
- -EncryptedData_decrypt
- Decrypt content using supplied symmetric key and algorithm using a CMS
EncryptedData type and output the content.
- -data_create
- Create a CMS Data type.
- -data_out
- Data type and output the content.
- -cmsout
- Takes an input message and writes out a PEM encoded CMS structure.
- -inform DER|PEM|SMIME
- The input format of the CMS structure (if one is being read); the default
is SMIME. See openssl-format-options(1) for details.
- -outform DER|PEM|SMIME
- The output format of the CMS structure (if one is being written); the
default is SMIME. See openssl-format-options(1) for
details.
- -rctform DER|PEM|SMIME
- The signed receipt format for use with the -receipt_verify; the
default is SMIME. See openssl-format-options(1) for
details.
- -stream, -indef
- The -stream and -indef options are equivalent and enable
streaming I/O for encoding operations. This permits single pass processing
of data without the need to hold the entire contents in memory,
potentially supporting very large files. Streaming is automatically set
for S/MIME signing with detached data if the output format is SMIME
it is currently off by default for all other operations.
- -noindef
- Disable streaming I/O where it would produce and indefinite length
constructed encoding. This option currently has no effect. In future
streaming will be enabled by default on all relevant operations and this
option will disable it.
- -binary
- Normally the input message is converted to "canonical" format
which is effectively using CR and LF as end of line: as required by the
S/MIME specification. When this option is present no translation occurs.
This is useful when handling binary data which may not be in MIME
format.
- -crlfeol
- Normally the output file uses a single LF as end of line. When this
option is present CRLF is used instead.
- -asciicrlf
- When signing use ASCII CRLF format canonicalisation. This strips trailing
whitespace from all lines, deletes trailing blank lines at EOF and sets
the encapsulated content type. This option is normally used with detached
content and an output signature format of DER. This option is not normally
needed when verifying as it is enabled automatically if the encapsulated
content format is detected.
- -pwri_password password
- Specify password for recipient.
- -secretkey key
- Specify symmetric key to use. The key must be supplied in hex format and
be consistent with the algorithm used. Supported by the
-EncryptedData_encrypt -EncryptedData_decrypt,
-encrypt and -decrypt options. When used with
-encrypt or -decrypt the supplied key is used to wrap or
unwrap the content encryption key using an AES key in the
KEKRecipientInfo type.
- -secretkeyid id
- The key identifier for the supplied symmetric key for
KEKRecipientInfo type. This option must be present if the
-secretkey option is used with -encrypt. With
-decrypt operations the id is used to locate the relevant
key if it is not supplied then an attempt is used to decrypt any
KEKRecipientInfo structures.
- -inkey filename|uri
- The private key to use when signing or decrypting. This must match the
corresponding certificate. If this option is not specified then the
private key must be included in the certificate file specified with the
-recip or -signer file. When signing this option can be used
multiple times to specify successive keys.
- -passin arg
- The private key password source. For more information about the format of
arg see openssl-passphrase-options(1).
- -keyopt name:parameter
- For signing and encryption this option can be used multiple times to set
customised parameters for the preceding key or certificate. It can
currently be used to set RSA-PSS for signing, RSA-OAEP for encryption or
to modify default parameters for ECDH.
- -keyform DER|PEM|P12|ENGINE
- The format of the private key file; unspecified by default. See
openssl-format-options(1) for details.
- -engine id
- See "Engine Options" in openssl(1). This option is
deprecated.
- -provider name
- -provider-path path
- -propquery propq
- See "Provider Options" in openssl(1), provider(7),
and property(7).
- -rand files, -writerand file
- See "Random State Options" in openssl(1) for
details.
- -originator file
- A certificate of the originator of the encrypted message. Necessary for
decryption when Key Agreement is in use for a shared key.
- -recip file
- When decrypting a message this specifies the certificate of the recipient.
The certificate must match one of the recipients of the message.
When encrypting a message this option may be used multiple
times to specify each recipient. This form must be used if
customised parameters are required (for example to specify
RSA-OAEP).
Only certificates carrying RSA, Diffie-Hellman or EC keys are
supported by this option.
- recipient-cert ...
- This is an alternative to using the -recip option when encrypting a
message. One or more certificate filennames may be given.
- -cipher
- The encryption algorithm to use. For example triple DES (168 bits) -
-des3 or 256 bit AES - -aes256. Any standard algorithm name
(as used by the EVP_get_cipherbyname() function) can also be used
preceded by a dash, for example -aes-128-cbc. See
openssl-enc(1) for a list of ciphers supported by your version of
OpenSSL.
Currently the AES variants with GCM mode are the only
supported AEAD algorithms.
If not specified triple DES is used. Only used with
-encrypt and -EncryptedData_create commands.
- -wrap cipher
- Cipher algorithm to use for key wrap when encrypting the message using Key
Agreement for key transport. The algorithm specified should be suitable
for key wrap.
- -aes128-wrap, -aes192-wrap, -aes256-wrap,
-des3-wrap
- Use AES128, AES192, AES256, or 3DES-EDE, respectively, to wrap key.
Depending on the OpenSSL build options used, -des3-wrap may not be
supported.
- -debug_decrypt
- This option sets the CMS_DEBUG_DECRYPT flag. This option should be
used with caution: see the notes section below.
- -md digest
- Digest algorithm to use when signing or resigning. If not present then the
default digest algorithm for the signing key will be used (usually
SHA1).
- -signer file
- A signing certificate. When signing or resigning a message, this option
can be used multiple times if more than one signer is required.
- -certfile file
- Allows additional certificates to be specified. When signing these will be
included with the message. When verifying these will be searched for the
signers certificates. The input can be in PEM, DER, or PKCS#12
format.
- -cades
- When used with -sign, add an ESS signingCertificate or ESS
signingCertificateV2 signed-attribute to the SignerInfo, in order to make
the signature comply with the requirements for a CAdES Basic Electronic
Signature (CAdES-BES).
- -nodetach
- When signing a message use opaque signing: this form is more resistant to
translation by mail relays but it cannot be read by mail agents that do
not support S/MIME. Without this option cleartext signing with the MIME
type multipart/signed is used.
- -nocerts
- When signing a message the signer's certificate is normally included with
this option it is excluded. This will reduce the size of the signed
message but the verifier must have a copy of the signers certificate
available locally (passed using the -certfile option for
example).
- -noattr
- Normally when a message is signed a set of attributes are included which
include the signing time and supported symmetric algorithms. With this
option they are not included.
- -nosmimecap
- Exclude the list of supported algorithms from signed attributes, other
options such as signing time and content type are still included.
- -receipt_request_all, -receipt_request_first
- For -sign option include a signed receipt request. Indicate
requests should be provided by all recipient or first tier recipients
(those mailed directly and not from a mailing list). Ignored it
-receipt_request_from is included.
- -receipt_request_from emailaddress
- For -sign option include a signed receipt request. Add an explicit
email address where receipts should be supplied.
- -receipt_request_to emailaddress
- Add an explicit email address where signed receipts should be sent to.
This option must but supplied if a signed receipt is
requested.
- -signer file
- If a message has been verified successfully then the signers
certificate(s) will be written to this file if the verification was
successful.
- -content filename
- This specifies a file containing the detached content for operations
taking S/MIME input, such as the -verify command. This is only
usable if the CMS structure is using the detached signature form where the
content is not included. This option will override any content if the
input format is S/MIME and it uses the multipart/signed MIME content
type.
- -no_content_verify
- Do not verify signed content signatures.
- -no_attr_verify
- Do not verify signed attribute signatures.
- -nosigs
- Don't verify message signature.
- -noverify
- Do not verify the signers certificate of a signed message.
- -nointern
- When verifying a message normally certificates (if any) included in the
message are searched for the signing certificate. With this option only
the certificates specified in the -certfile option are used. The
supplied certificates can still be used as untrusted CAs however.
- -cades
- When used with -verify, require and check signer certificate
digest. See the NOTES section for more details.
- -verify_retcode
- Exit nonzero on verification failure.
- -CAfile file, -no-CAfile, -CApath dir,
-no-CApath, -CAstore uri, -no-CAstore
- See "Trusted Certificate Options" in
openssl-verification-options(1) for details.
- -keyid
- Use subject key identifier to identify certificates instead of issuer name
and serial number. The supplied certificate must include a subject
key identifier extension. Supported by -sign and -encrypt
options.
- -econtent_type type
- Set the encapsulated content type to type if not supplied the
Data type is used. The type argument can be any valid OID
name in either text or numerical format.
- -text
- This option adds plain text (text/plain) MIME headers to the supplied
message if encrypting or signing. If decrypting or verifying it strips off
text headers: if the decrypted or verified message is not of MIME type
text/plain then an error occurs.
- -certsout file
- Any certificates contained in the input message are written to
file.
- -to, -from, -subject
- The relevant email headers. These are included outside the signed portion
of a message so they may be included manually. If signing then many S/MIME
mail clients check the signers certificate's email address matches that
specified in the From: address.
- -noout
- For the -cmsout operation do not output the parsed CMS structure.
This is useful if the syntax of the CMS structure is being checked.
- -print
- For the -cmsout operation print out all fields of the CMS
structure. This implies -noout. This is mainly useful for testing
purposes.
- -nameopt option
- For the -cmsout operation when -print option is in use,
specifies printing options for string fields. For most cases utf8
is reasonable value. See openssl-namedisplay-options(1) for
details.
- -receipt_request_print
- For the -verify operation print out the contents of any signed
receipt requests.
- -allow_proxy_certs, -attime, -no_check_time,
-check_ss_sig, -crl_check, -crl_check_all,
-explicit_policy, -extended_crl, -ignore_critical,
-inhibit_any, -inhibit_map, -no_alt_chains,
-partial_chain, -policy, -policy_check,
-policy_print, -purpose, -suiteB_128,
-suiteB_128_only, -suiteB_192, -trusted_first,
-use_deltas, -auth_level, -verify_depth,
-verify_email, -verify_hostname, -verify_ip,
-verify_name, -x509_strict -issuer_checks
- Set various options of certificate chain verification. See
"Verification Options" in openssl-verification-options(1)
for details.
Any validation errors cause the command to exit.
The MIME message must be sent without any blank lines between the headers and
the output. Some mail programs will automatically add a blank line. Piping the
mail directly to sendmail is one way to achieve the correct format.
The supplied message to be signed or encrypted must include the
necessary MIME headers or many S/MIME clients won't display it properly (if
at all). You can use the -text option to automatically add plain text
headers.
A "signed and encrypted" message is one where a signed
message is then encrypted. This can be produced by encrypting an already
signed message: see the examples section.
This version of the program only allows one signer per message but
it will verify multiple signers on received messages. Some S/MIME clients
choke if a message contains multiple signers. It is possible to sign
messages "in parallel" by signing an already signed message.
The options -encrypt and -decrypt reflect common
usage in S/MIME clients. Strictly speaking these process CMS enveloped data:
CMS encrypted data is used for other purposes.
The -resign option uses an existing message digest when
adding a new signer. This means that attributes must be present in at least
one existing signer using the same message digest or this operation will
fail.
The -stream and -indef options enable streaming I/O
support. As a result the encoding is BER using indefinite length constructed
encoding and no longer DER. Streaming is supported for the -encrypt
operation and the -sign operation if the content is not detached.
Streaming is always used for the -sign operation with
detached data but since the content is no longer part of the CMS structure
the encoding remains DER.
If the -decrypt option is used without a recipient
certificate then an attempt is made to locate the recipient by trying each
potential recipient in turn using the supplied private key. To thwart the
MMA attack (Bleichenbacher's attack on PKCS #1 v1.5 RSA padding) all
recipients are tried whether they succeed or not and if no recipients match
the message is "decrypted" using a random key which will typically
output garbage. The -debug_decrypt option can be used to disable the
MMA attack protection and return an error if no recipient can be found: this
option should be used with caution. For a fuller description see
CMS_decrypt(3)).
A CAdES Basic Electronic Signature (CAdES-BES), as defined in the European
Standard ETSI EN 319 122-1 V1.1.1, contains:
- 0
- The operation was completely successfully.
- 1
- An error occurred parsing the command options.
- 2
- One of the input files could not be read.
- 3
- An error occurred creating the CMS file or when reading the MIME
message.
- 4
- An error occurred decrypting or verifying the message.
- 5
- The message was verified correctly but an error occurred writing out the
signers certificates.
openssl-smime(1) can only process the older PKCS#7 format.
openssl cms supports Cryptographic Message Syntax format. Use of some
features will result in messages which cannot be processed by applications
which only support the older format. These are detailed below.
The use of the -keyid option with -sign or
-encrypt.
The -outform PEM option uses different headers.
The -compress option.
The -secretkey option when used with -encrypt.
The use of PSS with -sign.
The use of OAEP or non-RSA keys with -encrypt.
Additionally the -EncryptedData_create and
-data_create type cannot be processed by the older
openssl-smime(1) command.
Create a cleartext signed message:
openssl cms -sign -in message.txt -text -out mail.msg \
-signer mycert.pem
Create an opaque signed message
openssl cms -sign -in message.txt -text -out mail.msg -nodetach \
-signer mycert.pem
Create a signed message, include some additional certificates and
read the private key from another file:
openssl cms -sign -in in.txt -text -out mail.msg \
-signer mycert.pem -inkey mykey.pem -certfile mycerts.pem
Create a signed message with two signers, use key identifier:
openssl cms -sign -in message.txt -text -out mail.msg \
-signer mycert.pem -signer othercert.pem -keyid
Send a signed message under Unix directly to sendmail, including
headers:
openssl cms -sign -in in.txt -text -signer mycert.pem \
-from steve@openssl.org -to someone@somewhere \
-subject "Signed message" | sendmail someone@somewhere
Verify a message and extract the signer's certificate if
successful:
openssl cms -verify -in mail.msg -signer user.pem -out signedtext.txt
Send encrypted mail using triple DES:
openssl cms -encrypt -in in.txt -from steve@openssl.org \
-to someone@somewhere -subject "Encrypted message" \
-des3 user.pem -out mail.msg
Sign and encrypt mail:
openssl cms -sign -in ml.txt -signer my.pem -text \
| openssl cms -encrypt -out mail.msg \
-from steve@openssl.org -to someone@somewhere \
-subject "Signed and Encrypted message" -des3 user.pem
Note: the encryption command does not include the -text
option because the message being encrypted already has MIME headers.
Decrypt a message:
openssl cms -decrypt -in mail.msg -recip mycert.pem -inkey key.pem
The output from Netscape form signing is a PKCS#7 structure with
the detached signature format. You can use this program to verify the
signature by line wrapping the base64 encoded structure and surrounding it
with:
-----BEGIN PKCS7-----
-----END PKCS7-----
and using the command,
openssl cms -verify -inform PEM -in signature.pem -content content.txt
alternatively you can base64 decode the signature and use
openssl cms -verify -inform DER -in signature.der -content content.txt
Create an encrypted message using 128 bit Camellia:
openssl cms -encrypt -in plain.txt -camellia128 -out mail.msg cert.pem
Add a signer to an existing message:
openssl cms -resign -in mail.msg -signer newsign.pem -out mail2.msg
Sign a message using RSA-PSS:
openssl cms -sign -in message.txt -text -out mail.msg \
-signer mycert.pem -keyopt rsa_padding_mode:pss
Create an encrypted message using RSA-OAEP:
openssl cms -encrypt -in plain.txt -out mail.msg \
-recip cert.pem -keyopt rsa_padding_mode:oaep
Use SHA256 KDF with an ECDH certificate:
openssl cms -encrypt -in plain.txt -out mail.msg \
-recip ecdhcert.pem -keyopt ecdh_kdf_md:sha256
Print CMS signed binary data in human-readable form:
openssl cms -in signed.cms -binary -inform DER -cmsout -print
The MIME parser isn't very clever: it seems to handle most messages that I've
thrown at it but it may choke on others.
The code currently will only write out the signer's certificate to
a file: if the signer has a separate encryption certificate this must be
manually extracted. There should be some heuristic that determines the
correct encryption certificate.
Ideally a database should be maintained of a certificates for each
email address.
The code doesn't currently take note of the permitted symmetric
encryption algorithms as supplied in the SMIMECapabilities signed attribute.
this means the user has to manually include the correct encryption
algorithm. It should store the list of permitted ciphers in a database and
only use those.
No revocation checking is done on the signer's certificate.
The use of multiple -signer options and the -resign command were
first added in OpenSSL 1.0.0.
The -keyopt option was added in OpenSSL 1.0.2.
Support for RSA-OAEP and RSA-PSS was added in OpenSSL 1.0.2.
The use of non-RSA keys with -encrypt and -decrypt
was added in OpenSSL 1.0.2.
The -no_alt_chains option was added in OpenSSL 1.0.2b.
The -nameopt option was added in OpenSSL 3.0.0.
The -engine option was deprecated in OpenSSL 3.0.
Copyright 2008-2021 The OpenSSL Project Authors. All Rights Reserved.
Licensed under the Apache License 2.0 (the "License").
You may not use this file except in compliance with the License. You can
obtain a copy in the file LICENSE in the source distribution or at
<https://www.openssl.org/source/license.html>.