[Building Sakai] Encrypt the password in sakai.properties

[Noah Botimer]

Another option is to use user permissions/connections at the database and a specific user for Tomcat. This managed differently by each database and can be a little tricky, especially in multiple-machine configurations, which is where you'd likely be looking for this kind of option.

In general, the security.properties approach, where the file is readable only by the Tomcat user and administrators, has worked well across the community.

The only way to remove all stored credentials from an application server is something like my first suggestion with user and IP on as authentication (on a secured network). This is more complex than most Sakai installations need.

Thanks,
-Noah

On Dec 26, 2012, at 2:32 PM, Matthew Jones <matthew at longsight.com> wrote:

> Right, who are you trying to protect the password from?
> 
> It would be useless for Sakai to put an encryption in the code because either the algorithm would be public so everyone could just use it or would require some un-encrypted key that you'd still have to put somewhere, making no difference over the current solution.
> 
> If you're trying to protect it from someone who has root on that machine, you'd probably either need to rebuild the jar with the password in it or put some kind of decryption algorithm in there. Someone determined could still figure out what it's doing by decompling the class file but it would help.
> 
> If you're trying to protect it from other users on the system, just set the permissions correctly on the file.
> 
> If you're just wanting to keep it out of the tomcat directory so it doesn't mistakenly get committed or read, then you can use the security.properties as Seth suggests.
> 
> This is the same problem for SSL keys like in Apache. You either have to hard-coded it as is, have no password or type it in every-time you restart. The third option isn't supported for Sakai. 
> 
> 
> On Wed, Dec 26, 2012 at 2:01 PM, Seth Theriault <slt at columbia.edu> wrote:
> On Wed, Dec 26, 2012 at 11:42 AM, D Yun <yun14u at yahoo.com> wrote:
> 
> > I'm using Sakai 2.9.x with Tomcat 7 and MySQL 5.5.   My question is related
> > with sakai.properties.  How difficult is it to implement encrypt the
> > following line ?
> >
> > password at javax.sql.BaseDataSource=ironchef
> >
> >
> > Something like this 2 lines will be perfect.
> >
> > password.securityEnabled=true
> > password at javax.sql.BaseDataSource={xor}KDo+LTcwKiw6bm9u
> 
> Sensitive information like database passwords and the like are usually
> specified in a "security.properties" file that is protected outside of
> Sakai's Tomcat file structure. Take a look at this (old) doc for more
> configuration info:
> 
> https://source.sakaiproject.org/svn/reference/trunk/docs/architecture/sakai_config.doc
> 
> Once you set up a security.properties file, values specified there can
> be substituted a la:
> 
> -- security.properties
> 
> myPassword=ironchef
> 
> -- sakai.properties
> 
> password at javax.sql.BaseDataSource=${myPassword}
> 
> Seth
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