[16.0.0.4 and later]

Consuming JSON Web Tokens in Liberty

You can programmatically verify and parse JSON Web Token (JWT) tokens by configuring the JWT consumer element in the server configuration and implementing the com.ibm.websphere.security.jwt.JwtConsumer and com.ibm.websphere.security.jwt.JwtToken APIs in your applications.

About this task

For information about JWT APIs, see the JSON Web Token Java documentation or the API documentation included in the product in the ${wlp.install.dir}/dev directory.

Procedure

  1. In the server.xml file, add the jwt-1.0 feature.
    <featureManager>
        <feature>jwt-1.0</feature>
        ...
    </featureManager>
  2. Configure the JWT consumer by modifying the jwtConsumer element.

    For information about jwtConsumer attributes that you can configure, see JWT Consumer (jwtConsumer).

    When you add the jwt-1.0 feature and save your changes, Liberty adds the following default jwtConsumer element.
    <jwtConsumer id="defaultJWTConsumer">
    </jwtConsumer>
    In this default configuration, the following values are assumed:
    • The alg header of the consumed JWT is RS256. You can configure this value on the signatureAlgorithm attribute.
    • A JWT is considered to be valid within 5 minutes of the exp, nbf, and iat claims. You can configure this value on the clockSkew attribute.

    You can reconfigure this default jwtConsumer element, or create one or more other jwtConsumer elements. Each jwtConsumer element must have a unique, URL-safe string specified as the id attribute. If the ID is missing, the jwtConsumer is not processed.

    For JWT tokens that are signed with RS256 and an X.509 certificate, you must configure the trustStoreRef and trustAliasName attributes so that you can locate the signature verification key.
    1. Import the JWT issuer's X.509 certificate into the truststore.
    2. In the jwtConsumer element, specify the truststore ID and the certificate alias.
      <jwtConsumer id="defaultJWTConsumer" trustStoreRef="truststore_id" trustAliasName="certificate_alias">
      </jwtConsumer>
  3. Programmatically verify and parse JWT tokens by implementing the com.ibm.websphere.security.jwt.JwtConsumer and com.ibm.websphere.security.jwt.JwtToken APIs in your application.

    For more information, see the JSON Web Token Java documentation.

    1. Create a JwtConsumer object
      If you do not specify a configuration ID, the object is tied to the default jwtConsumer configuration.
      com.ibm.websphere.security.jwt.JwtConsumer jwtConsumer = JwtConsumer.create();
      If you specify a configuration ID, the object is tied to the jwtConsumer configuration with the specified ID.
      com.ibm.websphere.security.jwt.JwtConsumer jwtConsumer = JwtConsumer.create("jwtConsumer_configuration_id");
    2. Verify and parse a JWT token by implementing the com.ibm.websphere.security.jwt.JwtToken API.
      JwtToken jwtToken = jwtConsumer.createJwt("Base64_encoded_JWT_token>");

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Timestamp icon Last updated: Saturday, 3 December 2016
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