Unable to find valid certification path to requested target – error even after cert imported

I have a Java client trying to access a server with a self-signed certificate.

When I try to Post to the server, I get the following error:

unable to find valid certification path to requested target

Having done some research on the issue, I then did the following.

1. Saved my servers domain name as a root.cer file.

2. In my Glassfish server’s JRE, I ran this:

   keytool -import -alias example -keystore cacerts -file root.cer
   

3. To check the cert was added to my cacert successfully, I did this:

   keytool -list -v -keystore cacerts
   

   I can see the cert is present.

4. I then restarted Glassfish and retried the ‘post’.

I am still getting the same error.

I have a feeling this is because my Glassfish is not actually reading the cacert file that I have amended but maybe some other one.

Have any of you had this issue and can push me in the right direction?

Answer

Unfortunately – it could be many things – and lots of app servers and other java ‘wrappers’ are prone to play with properties and their ‘own’ take on keychains and what not. So it may be looking at something totally different.

Short of truss-ing – I’d try:

java -Djavax.net.debug=all -Djavax.net.ssl.trustStore=trustStore ...

to see if that helps. Instead of ‘all’ one can also set it to ‘ssl’, key manager and trust manager – which may help in your case. Setting it to ‘help’ will list something like below on most platforms.

Regardless – do make sure you fully understand the difference between the keystore (in which you have the private key and cert you prove your own identity with) and the trust store (which determines who you trust) – and the fact that your own identity also has a ‘chain’ of trust to the root – which is separate from any chain to a root you need to figure out ‘who’ you trust.

all            turn on all debugging
ssl            turn on ssl debugging

The   following can be used with ssl:
    record       enable per-record tracing
    handshake    print each handshake message
    keygen       print key generation data
    session      print session activity
    defaultctx   print default SSL initialization
    sslctx       print SSLContext tracing
    sessioncache print session cache tracing
    keymanager   print key manager tracing
    trustmanager print trust manager tracing
    pluggability print pluggability tracing

    handshake debugging can be widened with:
    data         hex dump of each handshake message
    verbose      verbose handshake message printing

    record debugging can be widened with:
    plaintext    hex dump of record plaintext
    packet       print raw SSL/TLS packets

Source: # See http://download.oracle.com/javase/1.5.0/docs/guide/security/jsse/JSSERefGuide.html#Debug