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https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/DERBY-866?page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:comment-tabpanel&focusedCommentId=13117371#comment-13117371
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Rick Hillegas commented on DERBY-866:
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Thanks for the analysis and questions, Dag. Some responses follow:
- q1: the password in the system table is the result of the hash, right? (not
the password itself)
- q2: salting?
Right. The password in the system table should be salted and hashed.
- q3: should the system table be encrypted to avoid attacks? currently we
encrypt entire database which may not be what one wants(?)
This sounds like a good idea but I'm not sure how to secure the encryption key
so that the database can be booted by someone other than the dbo. Any ideas?
- q4: boot-strap: how is the dbo user created? Autmatically when sing the
provided connection password when creating the database and seeing the property
for the new scheme set in derby.authentication.provider?
Right.
- q5: database only properties is not default, but must be enabled. will the
new mechanism work without it? (cf. derby.database.propertiesOnly) If so, the
authentication could be overridden by specifying another value for
derby.authentication.provider.
This is a good point. It is goofy that someone can masquerade as the DBO by
disabling authentication on the boot command line and then simply asserting
"user=dbo" at connection time--even when sql authorization is enabled. This is
a security hole for all of our authentication schemes. I'm afraid it's too late
to close this hole for the other schemes, but we could close it for this new
scheme. That would be independent of turning on derby.database.propertiesOnly
as part of the master security property. Thanks.
- q6: do you see the scheme requiring SQL authorization enabled? If not, we'd
need encryption to avoid attacks: arbitrary user could backup entire database
and stage dictionary attack against the USER table...Btw, I forget, *is* backup
restricted with authorization on? Docs doesn't say...
I think this is a good idea although it violates the orthogonality of the Derby
properties. I don't understand why anyone would want to run with authentication
but not authorization. The ability to do that is an unfortunate accident of our
backward compatibility requirements combined with the order in which we
implemented the two security mechanisms. Thanks.
- comment: creating a new user/role should cross-check each other to avoid
collisions in uids.
Good idea.
- comment: the new feature only solves the issue of database level
authentication, not system level, obviously (limitation)
Yes. This is another, closely related discussion we need to have. Thanks.
> Derby User Management Enhancements
> ----------------------------------
>
> Key: DERBY-866
> URL: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/DERBY-866
> Project: Derby
> Issue Type: Improvement
> Components: Services
> Affects Versions: 10.2.1.6
> Reporter: Francois Orsini
> Attachments: Derby_User_Enhancement.html,
> Derby_User_Enhancement_v1.1.html
>
>
> Proposal to enhance Derby's Built-In DDL User Management. (See proposal spec
> attached to the JIRA).
> Abstract:
> This feature aims at improving the way BUILT-IN users are managed in Derby by
> providing a more intuitive and familiar DDL interface. Currently (in
> 10.1.2.1), Built-In users can be defined at the system and/or database level.
> Users created at the system level can be defined via JVM or/and Derby system
> properties in the derby.properties file. Built-in users created at the
> database level are defined via a call to a Derby system procedure
> (SYSCS_UTIL.SYSCS_SET_DATABASE_PROPERTY) which sets a database property.
> Defining a user at the system level is very convenient and practical during
> the development phase (EOD) of an application - However, the user's password
> is not encrypted and consequently appears in clear in the derby.properties
> file. Hence, for an application going into production, whether it is embedded
> or not, it is preferable to create users at the database level where the
> password is encrypted.
> There is no real ANSI SQL standard for managing users in SQL but by providing
> a more intuitive and known interface, it will ease Built-In User management
> at the database level as well as Derby's adoption.
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