AWS CLI Command Reference

[ aws . kms ]

generate-data-key-pair

Description

Returns a unique asymmetric data key pair for use outside of KMS. This operation returns a plaintext public key, a plaintext private key, and a copy of the private key that is encrypted under the symmetric encryption KMS key you specify. You can use the data key pair to perform asymmetric cryptography and implement digital signatures outside of KMS. The bytes in the keys are random; they not related to the caller or to the KMS key that is used to encrypt the private key.

You can use the public key that GenerateDataKeyPair returns to encrypt data or verify a signature outside of KMS. Then, store the encrypted private key with the data. When you are ready to decrypt data or sign a message, you can use the Decrypt operation to decrypt the encrypted private key.

To generate a data key pair, you must specify a symmetric encryption KMS key to encrypt the private key in a data key pair. You cannot use an asymmetric KMS key or a KMS key in a custom key store. To get the type and origin of your KMS key, use the DescribeKey operation.

Use the KeyPairSpec parameter to choose an RSA or Elliptic Curve (ECC) data key pair. In China Regions, you can also choose an SM2 data key pair. KMS recommends that you use ECC key pairs for signing, and use RSA and SM2 key pairs for either encryption or signing, but not both. However, KMS cannot enforce any restrictions on the use of data key pairs outside of KMS.

If you are using the data key pair to encrypt data, or for any operation where you don’t immediately need a private key, consider using the GenerateDataKeyPairWithoutPlaintext operation. GenerateDataKeyPairWithoutPlaintext returns a plaintext public key and an encrypted private key, but omits the plaintext private key that you need only to decrypt ciphertext or sign a message. Later, when you need to decrypt the data or sign a message, use the Decrypt operation to decrypt the encrypted private key in the data key pair.

GenerateDataKeyPair returns a unique data key pair for each request. The bytes in the keys are random; they are not related to the caller or the KMS key that is used to encrypt the private key. The public key is a DER-encoded X.509 SubjectPublicKeyInfo, as specified in RFC 5280 . The private key is a DER-encoded PKCS8 PrivateKeyInfo, as specified in RFC 5958 .

You can use an optional encryption context to add additional security to the encryption operation. If you specify an EncryptionContext , you must specify the same encryption context (a case-sensitive exact match) when decrypting the encrypted data key. Otherwise, the request to decrypt fails with an InvalidCiphertextException . For more information, see Encryption Context in the Key Management Service Developer Guide .

The KMS key that you use for this operation must be in a compatible key state. For details, see Key states of KMS keys in the Key Management Service Developer Guide .

Cross-account use : Yes. To perform this operation with a KMS key in a different Amazon Web Services account, specify the key ARN or alias ARN in the value of the KeyId parameter.

Required permissions : kms:GenerateDataKeyPair (key policy)

Related operations:

  • Decrypt

  • Encrypt

  • GenerateDataKey

  • GenerateDataKeyPairWithoutPlaintext

  • GenerateDataKeyWithoutPlaintext

See also: AWS API Documentation

Synopsis

  generate-data-key-pair
[--encryption-context <value>]
--key-id <value>
--key-pair-spec <value>
[--grant-tokens <value>]
[--cli-input-json | --cli-input-yaml]
[--generate-cli-skeleton <value>]
[--debug]
[--endpoint-url <value>]
[--no-verify-ssl]
[--no-paginate]
[--output <value>]
[--query <value>]
[--profile <value>]
[--region <value>]
[--version <value>]
[--color <value>]
[--no-sign-request]
[--ca-bundle <value>]
[--cli-read-timeout <value>]
[--cli-connect-timeout <value>]
[--cli-binary-format <value>]
[--no-cli-pager]
[--cli-auto-prompt]
[--no-cli-auto-prompt]

Options

--encryption-context (map)

Specifies the encryption context that will be used when encrypting the private key in the data key pair.

An encryption context is a collection of non-secret key-value pairs that represent additional authenticated data. When you use an encryption context to encrypt data, you must specify the same (an exact case-sensitive match) encryption context to decrypt the data. An encryption context is supported only on operations with symmetric encryption KMS keys. On operations with symmetric encryption KMS keys, an encryption context is optional, but it is strongly recommended.

For more information, see Encryption context in the Key Management Service Developer Guide .

key -> (string)

value -> (string)

Shorthand Syntax:

KeyName1=string,KeyName2=string

JSON Syntax:

{"string": "string"
  ...}

--key-id (string)

Specifies the symmetric encryption KMS key that encrypts the private key in the data key pair. You cannot specify an asymmetric KMS key or a KMS key in a custom key store. To get the type and origin of your KMS key, use the DescribeKey operation.

To specify a KMS key, use its key ID, key ARN, alias name, or alias ARN. When using an alias name, prefix it with "alias/" . To specify a KMS key in a different Amazon Web Services account, you must use the key ARN or alias ARN.

For example:

  • Key ID: 1234abcd-12ab-34cd-56ef-1234567890ab

  • Key ARN: arn:aws:kms:us-east-2:111122223333:key/1234abcd-12ab-34cd-56ef-1234567890ab

  • Alias name: alias/ExampleAlias

  • Alias ARN: arn:aws:kms:us-east-2:111122223333:alias/ExampleAlias

To get the key ID and key ARN for a KMS key, use ListKeys or DescribeKey . To get the alias name and alias ARN, use ListAliases .

--key-pair-spec (string)

Determines the type of data key pair that is generated.

The KMS rule that restricts the use of asymmetric RSA and SM2 KMS keys to encrypt and decrypt or to sign and verify (but not both), and the rule that permits you to use ECC KMS keys only to sign and verify, are not effective on data key pairs, which are used outside of KMS. The SM2 key spec is only available in China Regions.

Possible values:

  • RSA_2048

  • RSA_3072

  • RSA_4096

  • ECC_NIST_P256

  • ECC_NIST_P384

  • ECC_NIST_P521

  • ECC_SECG_P256K1

  • SM2

--grant-tokens (list)

A list of grant tokens.

Use a grant token when your permission to call this operation comes from a new grant that has not yet achieved eventual consistency . For more information, see Grant token and Using a grant token in the Key Management Service Developer Guide .

(string)

Syntax:

"string" "string" ...

--cli-input-json | --cli-input-yaml (string) Reads arguments from the JSON string provided. The JSON string follows the format provided by --generate-cli-skeleton. If other arguments are provided on the command line, those values will override the JSON-provided values. It is not possible to pass arbitrary binary values using a JSON-provided value as the string will be taken literally. This may not be specified along with --cli-input-yaml.

--generate-cli-skeleton (string) Prints a JSON skeleton to standard output without sending an API request. If provided with no value or the value input, prints a sample input JSON that can be used as an argument for --cli-input-json. Similarly, if provided yaml-input it will print a sample input YAML that can be used with --cli-input-yaml. If provided with the value output, it validates the command inputs and returns a sample output JSON for that command. The generated JSON skeleton is not stable between versions of the AWS CLI and there are no backwards compatibility guarantees in the JSON skeleton generated.

Global Options

--debug (boolean)

Turn on debug logging.

--endpoint-url (string)

Override command’s default URL with the given URL.

--no-verify-ssl (boolean)

By default, the AWS CLI uses SSL when communicating with AWS services. For each SSL connection, the AWS CLI will verify SSL certificates. This option overrides the default behavior of verifying SSL certificates.

--no-paginate (boolean)

Disable automatic pagination.

--output (string)

The formatting style for command output.

  • json

  • text

  • table

  • yaml

  • yaml-stream

--query (string)

A JMESPath query to use in filtering the response data.

--profile (string)

Use a specific profile from your credential file.

--region (string)

The region to use. Overrides config/env settings.

--version (string)

Display the version of this tool.

--color (string)

Turn on/off color output.

  • on

  • off

  • auto

--no-sign-request (boolean)

Do not sign requests. Credentials will not be loaded if this argument is provided.

--ca-bundle (string)

The CA certificate bundle to use when verifying SSL certificates. Overrides config/env settings.

--cli-read-timeout (int)

The maximum socket read time in seconds. If the value is set to 0, the socket read will be blocking and not timeout. The default value is 60 seconds.

--cli-connect-timeout (int)

The maximum socket connect time in seconds. If the value is set to 0, the socket connect will be blocking and not timeout. The default value is 60 seconds.

--cli-binary-format (string)

The formatting style to be used for binary blobs. The default format is base64. The base64 format expects binary blobs to be provided as a base64 encoded string. The raw-in-base64-out format preserves compatibility with AWS CLI V1 behavior and binary values must be passed literally. When providing contents from a file that map to a binary blob fileb:// will always be treated as binary and use the file contents directly regardless of the cli-binary-format setting. When using file:// the file contents will need to properly formatted for the configured cli-binary-format.

  • base64

  • raw-in-base64-out

--no-cli-pager (boolean)

Disable cli pager for output.

--cli-auto-prompt (boolean)

Automatically prompt for CLI input parameters.

--no-cli-auto-prompt (boolean)

Disable automatically prompt for CLI input parameters.

Examples

Note

To use the following examples, you must have the AWS CLI installed and configured. See the Getting started guide in the AWS CLI User Guide for more information.

Unless otherwise stated, all examples have unix-like quotation rules. These examples will need to be adapted to your terminal’s quoting rules. See Using quotation marks with strings in the AWS CLI User Guide .

To generate an 2048-bit RSA asymmetric data key pair

The following generate-data-key-pair example requests a 2048-bit RSA asymmetric data key pair for use outside of AWS. The command returns a plaintext public key and a plaintext private key for immediate use and deletion, and a copy of the private key encrypted under the specified KMS key. You can safely store the encrypted private key with the encrypted data.

To request a 2048-bit RSA asymmetric data key pair, use the key-pair-spec parameter with a value of RSA_2048.

The KMS key you specify must be a symmetric encryption KMS key, that is, a KMS key with a KeySpec value of SYMMETRIC_DEFAULT.

NOTE: The values in the output of this example are truncated for display.

aws kms generate-data-key-pair \
    --key-id 1234abcd-12ab-34cd-56ef-1234567890ab \
    --key-pair-spec RSA_2048

Output:

{
    "PrivateKeyCiphertextBlob": "AQIDAHi6LtupRpdKl2aJTzkK6FbhOtQkMlQJJH3PdtHvS/y+hAFFxmiD134doUDzMGmfCEtcAAAHaTCCB2UGCSqGSIb3DQEHBqCCB1...",
    "PrivateKeyPlaintext": "MIIG/QIBADANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAASCBucwggbjAgEAAoIBgQDcDd4YzI+u9Kfv4t2UkTWhShBXkekS4cBVt07I0P42ZgMf+YvU5IgS4ut...",
    "PublicKey": "MIIBojANBgkqhkiG9w0BAQEFAAOCAY8AMIIBigKCAYEA3A3eGMyPrvSn7+LdlJE1oUoQV5HpEuHAVbdOyND+NmYDH/mL1OSIEuLrcdZ5hrMH4pk83r40l...",
    "KeyId": "arn:aws:kms:us-west-2:111122223333:key/1234abcd-12ab-34cd-56ef-1234567890ab",
    "KeyPairSpec": "RSA_2048"
}

The PublicKey, PrivateKeyPlaintext, and PrivateKeyCiphertextBlob are returned in base64-encoded format.

For more information, see Data key pairs in the AWS Key Management Service Developer Guide.

Output

PrivateKeyCiphertextBlob -> (blob)

The encrypted copy of the private key. When you use the HTTP API or the Amazon Web Services CLI, the value is Base64-encoded. Otherwise, it is not Base64-encoded.

PrivateKeyPlaintext -> (blob)

The plaintext copy of the private key. When you use the HTTP API or the Amazon Web Services CLI, the value is Base64-encoded. Otherwise, it is not Base64-encoded.

PublicKey -> (blob)

The public key (in plaintext). When you use the HTTP API or the Amazon Web Services CLI, the value is Base64-encoded. Otherwise, it is not Base64-encoded.

KeyId -> (string)

The Amazon Resource Name (key ARN ) of the KMS key that encrypted the private key.

KeyPairSpec -> (string)

The type of data key pair that was generated.

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