Introduction
Laravel's encrypter uses OpenSSL to provide AES-256 and AES-128 encryption. You are strongly encouraged to use Laravel's built-in encryption facilities and not attempt to roll your own "home grown" encryption algorithms. All of Laravel's encrypted values are signed using a message authentication code (MAC) so that their underlying value can not be modified once encrypted.
Configuration
Before using Laravel's encrypter, you must set a key
option in your config/app.php
configuration file. You should use the php artisan key:generate
command to generate this key since this Artisan command will use PHP's secure random bytes generator to build your key. If this value is not properly set, all values encrypted by Laravel will be insecure.
Using The Encrypter
Encrypting A Value
You may encrypt a value using the encrypt
helper. All encrypted values are encrypted using OpenSSL and the AES-256-CBC
cipher. Furthermore, all encrypted values are signed with a message authentication code (MAC) to detect any modifications to the encrypted string:
<?php
namespace App\Http\Controllers;
use App\Http\Controllers\Controller;
use App\User;
use Illuminate\Http\Request;
class UserController extends Controller
{
/**
* Store a secret message for the user.
*
* @param Request $request
* @param int $id
* @return Response
*/
public function storeSecret(Request $request, $id)
{
$user = User::findOrFail($id);
$user->fill([
'secret' => encrypt($request->secret),
])->save();
}
}
Encrypting Without Serialization
Encrypted values are passed through serialize
during encryption, which allows for encryption of objects and arrays. Thus, non-PHP clients receiving encrypted values will need to unserialize
the data. If you would like to encrypt and decrypt values without serialization, you may use the encryptString
and decryptString
methods of the Crypt
facade:
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Crypt;
$encrypted = Crypt::encryptString('Hello world.');
$decrypted = Crypt::decryptString($encrypted);
Decrypting A Value
You may decrypt values using the decrypt
helper. If the value can not be properly decrypted, such as when the MAC is invalid, an Illuminate\Contracts\Encryption\DecryptException
will be thrown:
use Illuminate\Contracts\Encryption\DecryptException;
try {
$decrypted = decrypt($encryptedValue);
} catch (DecryptException $e) {
//
}