Package ml.alternet.security

This package aims to enhance security on passwords handled in the JVM.

See: Description

Interface Summary

Interface	Description
Password	A safe password, stored obfuscate.
Password.Clear	This class helps keeping low the period where a password appear in clear in the memory, in order to make it difficult to find when a memory dump is performed.
PasswordManager	A concrete implementation should supply obfuscate Passwords according to the level of security expected.

Class Summary

Class	Description
EmptyPassword	The empty password (use it as a placeholder for a password when no password is supplied.
PasswordManagerFactory	A factory that can supply different flavors of PasswordManager.

Enum Summary

Enum	Description
PasswordState	Indicates whether a password is empty, valid, or invalid.

Annotation Types Summary

Annotation Type	Description
SensitiveData	Mark a data as sensitive data, that is to say should be destroyed after use and not remain too much time in memory.

Package ml.alternet.security Description

This package aims to enhance security on passwords handled in the JVM. The idea is to keep low the period where a password appear clear in the memory, in order to make it difficult to find when a memory dump is performed. http://alternet.ml/alternet-libs/security/security.html A password can be created thanks to PasswordManager, that exist in several flavors. To pick one, use the PasswordManagerFactory or supply your own implementation (your own implementation can override the default one with the discovery service).

Password creation

 // pick one of the available password manager
 // (replace XXX with the one you prefer)
 PasswordManager manager = PasswordManagerFactory.getXXXPasswordManager();
 Password pwd = manager.newPassword(pwdChars);
 // from this point,
 // pwd is safe for staying in memory as long as necessary,
 // pwdChars has been unset after the creation of the password.
 

Typical usage

try (Password.Clear clear = pwd.getClearCopy()) {
     char[] clearPwd = clear.get();
     // use clearPwd in the block
 }
 // at this point clearPwd has been unset
 // before being eligible by the garbage collector
 

The user has to ensure to keep the try-with-resource block as short as possible, and to not make copies of the char array if possible.

About passwords

The Crypto Specification states that since as String is immutable (and subject to be stored in a pool by the JVM), char arrays are preferred for storing password. Usually, a password may be used for accessing a resource ; before and after such access, the intermediate data used as the password should not remain in memory : the idea of the Password class is to allow a long-term store of the password between two resource accesses. Since the Password class obfuscate the data, if the memory is dumped it will be difficult to guess which part of the memory was a password. The idea is to limit usage of the clear password outside of the Password class. In many cases, the Password will be built from data that are coming from a string (such as an URI), it is recommended to not keep a strong reference to such data