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Procedure documentationCreating Secure Connections Using JavaMail Locate this document in the navigation structure

 

Applications that use the JavaMail Client Service can create secure connections with mail servers instead of plain connections. The security of connections can include the following aspects:

  • (Mandatory) Certificate-based authentication of the parties

  • (Optional) Signature and encryption of mail content

Procedure

1. Configure the Mail Client's Authentication Certificate

  1. Supply a custom certificate in the secure store.

    More information: Using the AS Java Key Storage

    Note Note

    The supplied certificate must be acceptable by the mail server.

    End of the note.

  2. Set the path to that certificate as a value of the sslCertificate property of the JavaMail Client Service.

    By default, the value of that property is a test certificate, installed in the secure store.

    Recommendation Recommendation

    We recommend that you do not use the default certificate. You have to change the value to point to the real authentication certificate.

    End of the recommendation.

    More information about managing service properties: Java System Properties

2. Define the Secure Connections Programmatically

Basically, the procedure requires that you supply the S-protocols (SMTPS, POP3S and IMAPS) instead of the plain ones.

To establish a secure connection with the corresponding server, pass a modified parameter to the getTransport or the getStore methods of the Session object respectively in the following way:

  • For secure SMTP, use getTransport(“smtps”) instead of getTransport(“smtp”).

  • For secure POP3, use getStore(“pop3s”) instead of getStore(“pop3”).

  • For secure IMAP, use getStore(“imaps”) instead of getStore(“imap”).

The following code example illustrates how to establish secure connections.

Syntax Syntax

  1. Transport tr = ses.getTransport("smtps");
//...
//Send the e-mail messages in the standard way.
Store store = ses.getStore("pop3s");
//...
//Receive e-mail messages from the server in the standard way.
End of the code.
3. Supply Mail Server Host and Port

There are two ways of supplying the mail server host and port information to be used by the mail client application:

  • By using the JavaMail Client Service configuration properties “as is”

    The JavaMail Client Service provides a complete set of configuration properties for specifying the mail server. You can use them “as is” in any mail application, without specifying anything further in the application itself.

    More information about the JavaMail Client Service properties: Configuring the JavaMail Client Service

  • By specifying server settings in the application source code

    This approach is useful if you want to specify server properties valid for your application only. Custom server properties defined in the source code override the corresponding server-related properties of the JavaMail Client Service.

The following table summarizes the specific details of using the JavaMail Client Service in your application code.

Server Type

Method

Parameters

SMTPS

Use the connect method of the Transport object.

Note Note

You need to specify these parameters if you do not want to use the default JavaMail Client Service configuration properties.

End of the note.

host — host name or IP address of the mail server

port — port to connect to

user — the user name to be used for authentication

password — password to be used for authentication

POP3S or IMAPS

Use the connect method of the Store object.
4. (Optional) Provide Signature and Encryption of E-mail Content

The JavaMail Client Service provides a basic, IAIK-library-based functionality for content encryption with support of the following MIME types:

  • multipart/signed

  • application/x-pkcs7-signature

  • application/x-pkcs7-mime

  • application/pkcs7-signature

  • application/pkcs7-mime

On top of this basic support, you can implement your own encryption algorithm to provide encryption, decryption, verifying and signing of the mail content. To do this, you can choose between either of the following options: