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Java 2 security policy files


The Java 2 Platform, Enterprise Edition (J2EE) V1.3 and later specifications have a well-defined programming model of responsibilities between the container providers and the application code. Using Java 2 security manager to help enforce this model is recommended. Certain operations are not supported in the application code because such operations interfere with the behavior and operation of the containers. The Java 2 security manager is used in WAS ND to enforce responsibilities of the container and the application code.

This product provides support for policy file management. A number of policy files in WAS are either static or dynamic. Dynamic policy is a template of permissions for a particular type of resource. No relative code base is defined in the dynamic policy template. The code base is dynamically calculated from the deployment and run-time data.

 

Static policy files


Table 1. Static policy files

Policy file Location
java.policy

APP_ROOT/java/jre/lib/security/java.policy. Default permissions are granted to all classes. The policy of this file applies to all the processes launched by WAS.

server.policy $WP_PROFILE/properties/server.policy. Default permissions are granted to all WAS servers.
client.policy $WP_PROFILE/properties/client.policy. Default permissions are granted for all of WAS client containers and applets on a node.

The static policy files are not managed by configuration and file replication services. Changes made in these files are local and are not replicated to other nodes in the ND cell.

 

Dynamic policy files


Table 2. Dynamic policy files

Policy file Location
spi.policy

$WP_PROFILE/config/cells/mycell
/nodes/mynode/spi.policy

This template is for the Service Provider Interface (SPI) or the third-party resources that are embedded in WAS ND. Examples of SPI are the JMS in MQ Series and Java database connectivity (JDBC) drivers. The code base for the embedded resources are dynamically determined from the configuration (resources.xml file) and run-time data, and permissions defined in the spi.policy files are automatically applied to these resources and JAR files specified in the class path of a resource adapter. The default permission of the spi.policy file is java.security.AllPermissions.

library.policy

$WP_PROFILE/config/cells/mycell/nodes
/node_name/library.policy

This template is for the library (Java library classes). We can define a shared library to use in multiple product applications. The default permission of the library.policy file is empty.

app.policy

$WP_PROFILE/config/cells/mycell
/nodes/mynode/app.policy The app.policy file defines the default permissions that are granted to all of the enterprise applications running on mynode in mycell.

Updates to app.policy only apply to the enterprise apps on the node to which app.policy belongs.

was.policy

$WP_PROFILE/config/cells/mycell
/applications/ear_file_name/deployments/
myapp/META-INF/was.policy

This template is for application-specific permissions. The was.policy file is embedded in the EAR file.

ra.xml rar_file_name/META-INF/was.policy.RAR.

This file can have a permission spec that is defined in the ra.xml file. The ra.xml file is embedded in the RAR file.

Grant entries specified in the app.policy and was.policy files must have a code base defined. If grant entries are specified without a code base, the policy files are not loaded properly and the application can fail. If the intent is to grant the permissions to all applications, use file:${application} as a code base in the grant entry.

 

Syntax of the policy file

A policy file contains several policy entries.

The following example depicts each policy entry format: 

grant [codebase <Codebase>] { permission <Permission>;
 permission <Permission>; permission <Permission>;
};

<CodeBase>:   A URL.
      For example,  "file:${java.home}/lib/tools.jar"
            When [codebase <Codebase>] is not specified, listed 
               permissions are applied to everything.
            If URL ends with a JAR file name,  only the classes in the 
               JAR file belong to the codebase.
               If URL ends with "/", only the class files in the specified
               directory belong to the codebase.
               If URL ends with "*", all JAR and class files in the specified
               directory belong to the codebase.
               If URL ends with "-", all JAR and class files in the specified 
               directory and its subdirectories belong to the codebase.
<Permissions>: Consists from
              Permission Type    : class name of the permission
               Target Name        : name specifying the target
               Actions            : actions allowed on target
      For example,             java.io.FilePermission "/tmp/xxx", "read,write"
Refer to developer kit specifications for the details of each permission.

 

Syntax of dynamic policy

We can define permissions for specific types of resources in dynamic policy files for an enterprise application. This action is achieved by using product-reserved symbols. The reserved symbol scope depends on where it is defined. If we define the permissions in app.policy, the symbol applies to all the resources on all of the enterprise apps that run on mynode. If we define the permissions in the META-INF/was.policy file, the symbol applies only to the specific enterprise application. Valid symbols for the code base are listed in the following table:


Table 3. Dynamic policy syntax

Symbol Meaning
file:${application} Permissions apply to all the resources within the application
file:${jars} Permissions apply to all the utility JAR files within the application
file:${ejbComponent} Permissions apply to the EJB resources within the application
file:${webComponent} Permissions apply to the Web resources within the application
file:${connectorComponent} Permissions apply to the connector resources within the application

We can specify the module name for a granular setting, except for these entries specified by the code base symbols. For example: 

grant codeBase "file:DefaultWebApplication.war" {
   permission java.security.SecurityPermission "printIdentity";
 };
 grant codeBase "file:IncCMP11.jar" { permission java.io.FilePermission 
"${user.install.root}${/}bin${/}DefaultDB${/}-", 
"read,write,delete";
};
The sixth and seventh lines in the previous code sample are one continuous line. Use a relative code base only in the META-INF/was.policy file. Several product-reserved symbols are defined to associate the permission lists to a specific type of resources.


Table 4. Dynamic policy syntax

Symbol Meaning
file:${application} Permissions apply to all the resources within the application
file:${jars} Permissions apply to all the utility JAR files within the application
file:${ejbComponent} Permissions apply to the enterprise beans resources within the application
file:${webComponent} Permissions apply to the Web resources within the application
file:${connectorComponent} Permissions apply to the connector resources both within the application and in the standalone connector resources.

Five embedded symbols are provided to specify the path and the name for the java.io.FilePermission permission. These symbols enable flexible permission specification. The absolute file path is fixed after the installation of the application.


Table 5. Dynamic policy syntax

Symbol Meaning
${app.installed.path} Path where the application is installed
${was.module.path} Path where the module is installed
${current.cell.name} Current cell name
${current.node.name} Current node name
${current.server.name} Current server name

Do not use the ${was.module.path} in the ${application} entry.

Carefully determine where to add a new permission. An incorrectly specified permission causes an AccessControlException exception. Because dynamic policy resolves the code base at runtime, determining which policy file has a problem is difficult. Add a permission only to the necessary resources. For example, use ${ejbcomponent}, and etc instead of ${application}, and update was.policy instead of app.policy, if possible.

 

Static policy filtering

Limited static policy filtering support exists. If app.policy and was.policy have permissions defined in the filter.policy file with thefilterMask keyword, the runtime removes the permissions from the applications and an audit message is logged. However, if the permissions defined in the app.policy and was.policys are compound permissions, for example, java.security.AllPermission, the permission is not removed, but a warning message is written to the log file. The policy filtering only supports Developer Kit permissions; the permissions package name begins with java or javax.

Run-time policy filtering support is provided to force stricter filtering. If app.policy and was.policy have permissions defined in the filter.policy file with the runtimeFilterMask keyword, the runtime removes the permissions from the applications no matter what permissions are granted to the application. For example, even if a was.policy file has the java.security.AllPermission permission granted to one of its modules, specified permissions such as the runtimeFilterMask permission are removed from the granted permission during runtime.

 

Policy file editing

Use the policy tool that is provided by the Developer Kit (APP_ROOT/java/jre/bin/policytool), to edit the previous policy files is recommended. For ND, extract the policy files from the repository before editing. After the policy file is extracted, use the policy tool to edit the file. Check the modified policy files into the repository and synchronize them with other nodes.

 

Troubleshooting

To debug the dynamic policy, choose one of three ways to generate the detail report of the AccessControlException exception.




Related concepts


Java 2 security

 

Related tasks


Protecting system resources and APIs (Java 2 security)
Use PolicyTool to edit policy files for Java 2 security