SSL request from Android app

Question

I am new to Java and working on an Android app. My APP is sending few GET/POST requests on EC2 beanstalk instance using SSL. However I am getting following errors while sending the HTTPS request:

Exception in thread "main" javax.net.ssl.SSLHandshakeException: sun.security.validator.ValidatorException: PKIX path building failed: sun.security.provider.certpath.SunCertPathBuilderException: unable to find valid certification path to requested target
    at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance0(Native Method)
    at sun.reflect.NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(NativeConstructorAccessorImpl.java:57)
    at sun.reflect.DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.newInstance(DelegatingConstructorAccessorImpl.java:45)
    at java.lang.reflect.Constructor.newInstance(Constructor.java:526)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection$6.run(HttpURLConnection.java:1676)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection$6.run(HttpURLConnection.java:1674)
    at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection.getChainedException(HttpURLConnection.java:1672)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection.getInputStream(HttpURLConnection.java:1245)
    at java.net.HttpURLConnection.getResponseCode(HttpURLConnection.java:468)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.https.HttpsURLConnectionImpl.getResponseCode(HttpsURLConnectionImpl.java:338)
    at Test.main(Test.java:19)
Caused by: javax.net.ssl.SSLHandshakeException: sun.security.validator.ValidatorException: PKIX path building failed: sun.security.provider.certpath.SunCertPathBuilderException: unable to find valid certification path to requested target
    at sun.security.ssl.Alerts.getSSLException(Alerts.java:192)
    at sun.security.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.fatal(SSLSocketImpl.java:1904)
    at sun.security.ssl.Handshaker.fatalSE(Handshaker.java:279)
    at sun.security.ssl.Handshaker.fatalSE(Handshaker.java:273)
    at sun.security.ssl.ClientHandshaker.serverCertificate(ClientHandshaker.java:1446)
    at sun.security.ssl.ClientHandshaker.processMessage(ClientHandshaker.java:209)
    at sun.security.ssl.Handshaker.processLoop(Handshaker.java:901)
    at sun.security.ssl.Handshaker.process_record(Handshaker.java:837)
    at sun.security.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.readRecord(SSLSocketImpl.java:1023)
    at sun.security.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.performInitialHandshake(SSLSocketImpl.java:1332)
    at sun.security.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.startHandshake(SSLSocketImpl.java:1359)
    at sun.security.ssl.SSLSocketImpl.startHandshake(SSLSocketImpl.java:1343)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.https.HttpsClient.afterConnect(HttpsClient.java:563)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.https.AbstractDelegateHttpsURLConnection.connect(AbstractDelegateHttpsURLConnection.java:185)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection.getInputStream(HttpURLConnection.java:1301)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.http.HttpURLConnection.getHeaderFields(HttpURLConnection.java:2714)
    at sun.net.www.protocol.https.HttpsURLConnectionImpl.getHeaderFields(HttpsURLConnectionImpl.java:283)
    at Test.main(Test.java:18)
Caused by: sun.security.validator.ValidatorException: PKIX path building failed: sun.security.provider.certpath.SunCertPathBuilderException: unable to find valid certification path to requested target
    at sun.security.validator.PKIXValidator.doBuild(PKIXValidator.java:385)
    at sun.security.validator.PKIXValidator.engineValidate(PKIXValidator.java:292)
    at sun.security.validator.Validator.validate(Validator.java:260)
    at sun.security.ssl.X509TrustManagerImpl.validate(X509TrustManagerImpl.java:326)
    at sun.security.ssl.X509TrustManagerImpl.checkTrusted(X509TrustManagerImpl.java:231)
    at sun.security.ssl.X509TrustManagerImpl.checkServerTrusted(X509TrustManagerImpl.java:126)
    at sun.security.ssl.ClientHandshaker.serverCertificate(ClientHandshaker.java:1428)
    ... 13 more
Caused by: sun.security.provider.certpath.SunCertPathBuilderException: unable to find valid certification path to requested target
    at sun.security.provider.certpath.SunCertPathBuilder.engineBuild(SunCertPathBuilder.java:196)
    at java.security.cert.CertPathBuilder.build(CertPathBuilder.java:268)
    at sun.security.validator.PKIXValidator.doBuild(PKIXValidator.java:380)
    ... 19 more

Either the server you are connecting to doesn't provide the complete nessecary certificate chain or your device is missing the nessecary root certificate. You'll have to inspect the certificates. — Gerald Schneider, Dec 02 '15 at 08:45
See this question for details (general java, not android specific): http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9619030/resolving-javax-net-ssl-sslhandshakeexception-sun-security-validator-validatore — Gerald Schneider, Dec 02 '15 at 08:49

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 02 '15 at 08:50

Android has provided a good article to deal with SSL.

This can happen for several reasons, including:

The CA that issued the server certificate was unknown.
The server certificate wasn't signed by a CA, but was self signed.
The server configuration is missing an intermediate CA.

You can read more in details in training article I have mentioned above.

SSL request from Android app

1 Answers1