DNSSEC-KEYGEN(8) BIND 9 DNSSEC-KEYGEN(8)
NAME
dnssec-keygen - DNSSEC key generation tool
SYNOPSIS
dnssec-keygen [-3] [-A date/offset] [-a algorithm] [-b keysize] [-C]
[-c class] [-D date/offset] [-d bits] [-D sync date/offset] [-E engine]
[-f flag] [-G] [-g generator] [-h] [-I date/offset] [-i interval] [-K
directory] [-k policy] [-L ttl] [-l file] [-n nametype] [-P date/off-
set] [-P sync date/offset] [-p protocol] [-q] [-R date/offset] [-S key]
[-s strength] [-T rrtype] [-t type] [-V] [-v level] {name}
DESCRIPTION
dnssec-keygen generates keys for DNSSEC (Secure DNS), as defined in RFC
2535 and RFC 4034. It can also generate keys for use with TSIG (Trans-
action Signatures) as defined in RFC 2845, or TKEY (Transaction Key) as
defined in RFC 2930.
The name of the key is specified on the command line. For DNSSEC keys,
this must match the name of the zone for which the key is being gener-
ated.
The dnssec-keymgr command acts as a wrapper around dnssec-keygen, gen-
erating and updating keys as needed to enforce defined security poli-
cies such as key rollover scheduling. Using dnssec-keymgr may be
preferable to direct use of dnssec-keygen.
OPTIONS
-3 Use an NSEC3-capable algorithm to generate a DNSSEC key. If this
option is used with an algorithm that has both NSEC and NSEC3
versions, then the NSEC3 version will be used; for example,
dnssec-keygen -3a RSASHA1 specifies the NSEC3RSASHA1 algorithm.
-a algorithm
Selects the cryptographic algorithm. For DNSSEC keys, the value
of algorithm must be one of RSASHA1, NSEC3RSASHA1, RSASHA256,
RSASHA512, ECDSAP256SHA256, ECDSAP384SHA384, ED25519 or ED448.
For TKEY, the value must be DH (Diffie Hellman); specifying his
value will automatically set the -T KEY option as well.
These values are case insensitive. In some cases, abbreviations
are supported, such as ECDSA256 for ECDSAP256SHA256 and ECDSA384
for ECDSAP384SHA384. If RSASHA1 is specified along with the -3
option, then NSEC3RSASHA1 will be used instead.
This parameter must be specified except when using the -S op-
tion, which copies the algorithm from the predecessor key.
In prior releases, HMAC algorithms could be generated for use as
TSIG keys, but that feature has been removed as of BIND 9.13.0.
Use tsig-keygen to generate TSIG keys.
-b keysize
Specifies the number of bits in the key. The choice of key size
depends on the algorithm used. RSA keys must be between 1024 and
4096 bits. Diffie Hellman keys must be between 128 and 4096
bits. Elliptic curve algorithms don't need this parameter.
If the key size is not specified, some algorithms have pre-de-
fined defaults. For example, RSA keys for use as DNSSEC zone
signing keys have a default size of 1024 bits; RSA keys for use
as key signing keys (KSKs, generated with -f KSK) default to
2048 bits.
-C Compatibility mode: generates an old-style key, without any tim-
ing metadata. By default, dnssec-keygen will include the key's
creation date in the metadata stored with the private key, and
other dates may be set there as well (publication date, activa-
tion date, etc). Keys that include this data may be incompatible
with older versions of BIND; the -C option suppresses them.
-c class
Indicates that the DNS record containing the key should have the
specified class. If not specified, class IN is used.
-d bits
Key size in bits. For the algorithms RSASHA1, NSEC3RSASA1,
RSASHA256 and RSASHA512 the key size must be in range 1024-4096.
DH size is between 128 and 4096. This option is ignored for al-
gorithms ECDSAP256SHA256, ECDSAP384SHA384, ED25519 and ED448.
-E engine
Specifies the cryptographic hardware to use, when applicable.
When BIND is built with OpenSSL PKCS#11 support, this defaults
to the string "pkcs11", which identifies an OpenSSL engine that
can drive a cryptographic accelerator or hardware service mod-
ule. When BIND is built with native PKCS#11 cryptography (--en-
able-native-pkcs11), it defaults to the path of the PKCS#11
provider library specified via "--with-pkcs11".
-f flag
Set the specified flag in the flag field of the KEY/DNSKEY
record. The only recognized flags are KSK (Key Signing Key) and
REVOKE.
-G Generate a key, but do not publish it or sign with it. This op-
tion is incompatible with -P and -A.
-g generator
If generating a Diffie Hellman key, use this generator. Allowed
values are 2 and 5. If no generator is specified, a known prime
from RFC 2539 will be used if possible; otherwise the default is
2.
-h Prints a short summary of the options and arguments to
dnssec-keygen.
-K directory
Sets the directory in which the key files are to be written.
-k policy
Create keys for a specific dnssec-policy. If a policy uses mul-
tiple keys, dnssec-keygen will generate multiple keys. This
will also create a ".state" file to keep track of the key state.
This option creates keys according to the dnssec-policy configu-
ration, hence it cannot be used together with many of the other
options that dnssec-keygen provides.
-L ttl Sets the default TTL to use for this key when it is converted
into a DNSKEY RR. If the key is imported into a zone, this is
the TTL that will be used for it, unless there was already a
DNSKEY RRset in place, in which case the existing TTL would take
precedence. If this value is not set and there is no existing
DNSKEY RRset, the TTL will default to the SOA TTL. Setting the
default TTL to 0 or none is the same as leaving it unset.
-l file
Provide a configuration file that contains a dnssec-policy
statement (matching the policy set with -k).
-n nametype
Specifies the owner type of the key. The value of nametype must
either be ZONE (for a DNSSEC zone key (KEY/DNSKEY)), HOST or EN-
TITY (for a key associated with a host (KEY)), USER (for a key
associated with a user(KEY)) or OTHER (DNSKEY). These values are
case insensitive. Defaults to ZONE for DNSKEY generation.
-p protocol
Sets the protocol value for the generated key, for use with -T
KEY. The protocol is a number between 0 and 255. The default is
3 (DNSSEC). Other possible values for this argument are listed
in RFC 2535 and its successors.
-q Quiet mode: Suppresses unnecessary output, including progress
indication. Without this option, when dnssec-keygen is run in-
teractively to generate an RSA or DSA key pair, it will print a
string of symbols to stderr indicating the progress of the key
generation. A '.' indicates that a random number has been found
which passed an initial sieve test; '+' means a number has
passed a single round of the Miller-Rabin primality test; a
space means that the number has passed all the tests and is a
satisfactory key.
-S key Create a new key which is an explicit successor to an existing
key. The name, algorithm, size, and type of the key will be set
to match the existing key. The activation date of the new key
will be set to the inactivation date of the existing one. The
publication date will be set to the activation date minus the
prepublication interval, which defaults to 30 days.
-s strength
Specifies the strength value of the key. The strength is a num-
ber between 0 and 15, and currently has no defined purpose in
DNSSEC.
-T rrtype
Specifies the resource record type to use for the key. rrtype
must be either DNSKEY or KEY. The default is DNSKEY when using a
DNSSEC algorithm, but it can be overridden to KEY for use with
SIG(0).
-t type
Indicates the use of the key, for use with -T KEY. type must be
one of AUTHCONF, NOAUTHCONF, NOAUTH, or NOCONF. The default is
AUTHCONF. AUTH refers to the ability to authenticate data, and
CONF the ability to encrypt data.
-V Prints version information.
-v level
Sets the debugging level.
TIMING OPTIONS
Dates can be expressed in the format YYYYMMDD or YYYYMMDDHHMMSS. If the
argument begins with a '+' or '-', it is interpreted as an offset from
the present time. For convenience, if such an offset is followed by one
of the suffixes 'y', 'mo', 'w', 'd', 'h', or 'mi', then the offset is
computed in years (defined as 365 24-hour days, ignoring leap years),
months (defined as 30 24-hour days), weeks, days, hours, or minutes,
respectively. Without a suffix, the offset is computed in seconds. To
explicitly prevent a date from being set, use 'none' or 'never'.
-P date/offset
Sets the date on which a key is to be published to the zone. Af-
ter that date, the key will be included in the zone but will not
be used to sign it. If not set, and if the -G option has not
been used, the default is "now".
-P sync date/offset
Sets the date on which CDS and CDNSKEY records that match this
key are to be published to the zone.
-A date/offset
Sets the date on which the key is to be activated. After that
date, the key will be included in the zone and used to sign it.
If not set, and if the -G option has not been used, the default
is "now". If set, if and -P is not set, then the publication
date will be set to the activation date minus the prepublication
interval.
-R date/offset
Sets the date on which the key is to be revoked. After that
date, the key will be flagged as revoked. It will be included in
the zone and will be used to sign it.
-I date/offset
Sets the date on which the key is to be retired. After that
date, the key will still be included in the zone, but it will
not be used to sign it.
-D date/offset
Sets the date on which the key is to be deleted. After that
date, the key will no longer be included in the zone. (It may
remain in the key repository, however.)
-D sync date/offset
Sets the date on which the CDS and CDNSKEY records that match
this key are to be deleted.
-i interval
Sets the prepublication interval for a key. If set, then the
publication and activation dates must be separated by at least
this much time. If the activation date is specified but the pub-
lication date isn't, then the publication date will default to
this much time before the activation date; conversely, if the
publication date is specified but activation date isn't, then
activation will be set to this much time after publication.
If the key is being created as an explicit successor to another
key, then the default prepublication interval is 30 days; other-
wise it is zero.
As with date offsets, if the argument is followed by one of the
suffixes 'y', 'mo', 'w', 'd', 'h', or 'mi', then the interval is
measured in years, months, weeks, days, hours, or minutes, re-
spectively. Without a suffix, the interval is measured in sec-
onds.
GENERATED KEYS
When dnssec-keygen completes successfully, it prints a string of the
form Knnnn.+aaa+iiiii to the standard output. This is an identification
string for the key it has generated.
o nnnn is the key name.
o aaa is the numeric representation of the algorithm.
o iiiii is the key identifier (or footprint).
dnssec-keygen creates two files, with names based on the printed
string. Knnnn.+aaa+iiiii.key contains the public key, and
Knnnn.+aaa+iiiii.private contains the private key.
The .key file contains a DNSKEY or KEY record. When a zone is being
signed by named or dnssec-signzone -S, DNSKEY records are included au-
tomatically. In other cases, the .key file can be inserted into a zone
file manually or with a $INCLUDE statement.
The .private file contains algorithm-specific fields. For obvious secu-
rity reasons, this file does not have general read permission.
EXAMPLE
To generate an ECDSAP256SHA256 zone-signing key for the zone exam-
ple.com, issue the command:
dnssec-keygen -a ECDSAP256SHA256 example.com
The command would print a string of the form:
Kexample.com.+013+26160
In this example, dnssec-keygen creates the files Kexam-
ple.com.+013+26160.key and Kexample.com.+013+26160.private.
To generate a matching key-signing key, issue the command:
dnssec-keygen -a ECDSAP256SHA256 -f KSK example.com
SEE ALSO
dnssec-signzone(8), BIND 9 Administrator Reference Manual, RFC 2539,
RFC 2845, RFC 4034.
AUTHOR
Internet Systems Consortium
COPYRIGHT
2020, Internet Systems Consortium
9.16.8-Debian 2020-10-13 DNSSEC-KEYGEN(8)