Encrypting zip files with a password based on Zip 2.0 encryption

3
votes

I am trying to zip and encrypt files in Java (1.6) with a password based on the earlier Zip 2.0 encryption. I have used AES 256 bit encrytpion to encrypt zip files with password and have successfully been able to do so.

Though AES is a stronger and a more secure encryption standard, i need to find a standard that is more widely supported across all zip clients so that the users have a higher success rates opening the password protected zip files. So i was looking for some Zip 2.0 based encryption to encrypt my files. Any help would be appreciated!

Thanks!

2
javaencryptionzippassword-protection
To anyone reading this question now (end of 2013ish): Don't use the builtin ZIP encryption, it's horrendously insecure and can be cracked in an hour by any half-decent programmer. - pg1989

2 Answers

1
votes

You can try Zip4j, a pure java library to handle zip file. It supports encryption/decryption of PKWare and AES encryption methods.

http://www.lingala.net/zip4j/

Key features:

  • Create, Add, Extract, Update, Remove files from a Zip file
  • Read/Write password protected Zip files
  • Supports AES 128/256 Encryption
  • Supports Standard Zip Encryption
  • Supports Zip64 format
  • Supports Store (No Compression) and Deflate compression method
  • Create or extract files from Split Zip files (Ex: z01, z02,...zip)
  • Supports Unicode file names
  • Progress Monitor

License:

  • Zip4j is released under Apache License, Version 2.0
-1
votes

I think that nearly all zip-clients do support the WinZip-AES-encryption. As WinZip is far more spread than the original pkzip, it's encryption has become the de-facto standard. Do you have a specific client which does not support the aes-encryption?