How to store and load cacerts.pem for gSoap-OpenSSL Android app

I am working on a C++ Android app that uses gSOAP with OpenSSL. To enable OpenSSL to validate the server certificate I need to provide it with location for the cacerts.pem file, otherwise all HTTPS connections fail.

My question is: What is the right way to store and load cacerts.pem on Android?

• I am able to copy cacerts.pem into the APK root by placing it in src/resources or res/raw/ or assets/. But SSL_CTX_load_verify_locations(ctx, "cacerts.pem", nullptr) fails to find the file. How can I make OpenSSL be able to read the PEM file inside APK?

• Is there a way to store cacerts.pem as a string buffer and thus avoid carrying it in the APK?

My app needs to talk to sharepoint online sites (https://*.example.com/)