javax.crypto
Interface SecretKey

All Superinterfaces:

Key, Serializable

All Known Subinterfaces:

PBEKey

All Known Implementing Classes:

KerberosKey, SecretKeySpec

public interface SecretKey

extends Key

A secret (symmetric) key.

This interface contains no methods or constants. Its only purpose is to group (and provide type safety for) secret keys.

Provider implementations of this interface must overwrite the equals and hashCode methods inherited from java.lang.Object, so that secret keys are compared based on their underlying key material and not based on reference.

Keys that implement this interface return the string RAW as their encoding format (see getFormat), and return the raw key bytes as the result of a getEncoded method call. (The getFormat and getEncoded methods are inherited from the java.security.Key parent interface.)

Since:

1.4

See Also:

SecretKeyFactory, Cipher

Field Summary

Fields inherited from interface java.security.Key

serialVersionUID

Methods inherited from interface java.security.Key

getAlgorithm, getEncoded, getFormat