public interface Key
extends Serializable
The Key interface is the top-level interface for all keys. It defines the functionality shared by all key objects. All keys have three characteristics:
This is the key algorithm for that key. The key algorithm is usually an encryption or asymmetric operation algorithm (such as DSA or RSA), which will work with those algorithms and with related algorithms (such as MD5 with RSA, SHA-1 with RSA, Raw DSA, etc.) The name of the algorithm of a key is obtained using the getAlgorithm method.
This is an external encoded form for the key used when a standard representation of the key is needed outside the Java Virtual Machine, as when transmitting the key to some other party. The key is encoded according to a standard format (such as X.509 or PKCS#8), and is returned using the getEncoded method.
This is the name of the format of the encoded key. It is returned by the getFormat method.