unsafe cryptographic encryption patterns , How to solve it?

Abdul Hanan :

I'm encrypting the password for firebase sign in, it's working well but I received a warning in google play console that your app contains unsafe cryptographic encryption patterns how can I get rid of it ??

I'm trying it on android studio.

public static class AESCrypt
{
    private static final String ALGORITHM = "AES";
    private static final String KEY = "1Hbfh667adfDEJ78";

    public static String encrypt(String value) throws Exception
    {
        Key key = generateKey();
        Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance(AESCrypt.ALGORITHM);
        cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, key);
        byte [] encryptedByteValue = cipher.doFinal(value.getBytes("utf-8"));
        String encryptedValue64 = Base64.encodeToString(encryptedByteValue, Base64.DEFAULT);
        return encryptedValue64;

    }

    public static String decrypt(String value) throws Exception
    {
        Key key = generateKey();
        Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance(AESCrypt.ALGORITHM);
        cipher.init(Cipher.DECRYPT_MODE, key);
        byte[] decryptedValue64 = Base64.decode(value, Base64.DEFAULT);
        byte [] decryptedByteValue = cipher.doFinal(decryptedValue64);
        String decryptedValue = new String(decryptedByteValue,"utf-8");
        return decryptedValue;

    }

    private static Key generateKey() throws Exception
    {
        Key key = new SecretKeySpec(AESCrypt.KEY.getBytes(),AESCrypt.ALGORITHM);
        return key;
    }

Boris :

The main issues are that you use a cipher with no integrity and a hard coded cryptographic key. If you analyse your source with Find Security Bugs you get CIPHER_INTEGRITY and HARD_CODE_KEY warning:

The cipher does not provide data integrity [com.lloyds.keystorage.AESCrypt] At AESCrypt.java:[line 25] CIPHER_INTEGRITY
The cipher does not provide data integrity [com.lloyds.keystorage.AESCrypt] At AESCrypt.java:[line 15] CIPHER_INTEGRITY
Hard coded cryptographic key found [com.lloyds.keystorage.AESCrypt] At AESCrypt.java:[line 35] HARD_CODE_KEY

The solution is to use a cipher that includes a Hash based Message Authentication Code (HMAC) to sign the data:

Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance("AES/GCM/NoPadding");

And to store the secret key in separate configuration files or keystores.

Below is the whole class after a full refactoring:

import android.util.Base64
import static java.nio.charset.StandardCharsets.UTF_8;
import java.security.Key;
import javax.crypto.Cipher;
import javax.crypto.spec.SecretKeySpec;

public class AESCrypt {
  private static final String TRANSFORMATION = "AES/GCM/NoPadding";

  public static String encrypt(String value) throws Exception {
    Key key = generateKey();
    Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance(TRANSFORMATION);
    cipher.init(Cipher.ENCRYPT_MODE, key);
    byte[] encryptedByteValue = cipher.doFinal(value.getBytes(UTF_8));
    return Base64.encodeToString(encryptedByteValue, Base64.DEFAULT);
  }

  public static String decrypt(String value) throws Exception {
    Key key = generateKey();
    Cipher cipher = Cipher.getInstance(TRANSFORMATION);
    cipher.init(Cipher.DECRYPT_MODE, key);
    byte[] decryptedValue64 = Base64.decode(value, Base64.DEFAULT);
    byte[] decryptedByteValue = cipher.doFinal(decryptedValue64);
    return new String(decryptedByteValue, UTF_8);
  }

  private static Key generateKey() {
    return new SecretKeySpec(Configuration.getKey().getBytes(UTF_8), TRANSFORMATION);
  }
}