Category Archives: Java EE

Firesheep: HTTP Session Hijacking made so easy !

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Way cool ! HTTP Session Hijacking can’t be made simpler than using Firesheep. Couple of days ago, a friend of mine suggested me to login a most popular website and he demonstrated how he took control and accessed my user session in less than a minute. First, I thought he used a network protocol analyser tool such as Wireshark or… Read more »

Hardware Assisted Security: Cryptographic Acceleration for SOA and Java EE applications

I’ve spent the last few days attending Oracle OpenWorld conference at San Francisco..it is my second OOW experience, so it is not a surprise to see the conference was fully packed with people, hundreds of sessions and demos – I did have an opportunity to attend few and also present two sessions focused on Security topics featuring “Hardware Assisted Security… Read more »

Java Cryptography on Intel Westmere

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When it comes to Java cryptography based application security –  Solaris has significant performance advantage over Linux and Windows on Intel Westmere processor equipped servers.  I am not debunking Linux performance on Intel but evidently Linux does not take advantage of Intel Westmere’s AES-NI instructions when the Java applications relies on Java cryptographic implementations  for performing AES encryption/decryption functions.  AES is one of the most popular symmetric-key encryption algorithm widely… Read more »

Secure Java Coding Guidelines v3.0

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When it comes to application security,  Secure coding is the first line of defense….and it is very critical to follow the best practice patterns and avoid pitfalls to secure the application from known risks and vulnerabities. The Java Security team has just released the updated – “Secure Coding Guidelines for the Java Programming Language, Version 3.0” .  Certainly it included a newer set of… Read more »

Java EE 6: Web Application Security made simple !

Java EE 6 RI was released few weeks ago….I am bit late to have my first look 🙂  Without a doubt, the new Web container security enhancements are very compelling for any budding or experienced Java developer working on Web applications. The Java EE 6 has unveiled several new security features with ease of use and targetted for simplified Web… Read more »

Does your Performance Tests address Security ?

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The untold reality is ….when your Web application on the DMZ hits the Internet… the colorful performance graphs/numbers does’nt mean anything !  Unless your performance guru in the lab captured the QoS requirements and realized it proactively and accounted its actual overheads associated with Security, Network bandwidth, High-availability and other mission-critical requirements.  Otherwise…performance is the nagging issue that every datacenter guy gnaws…. when an application… Read more »

Design Patterns: 15 years now and counting…

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Time flies..it is amazing to know, yesterday marked the 15th anniversary of Design Patterns: Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software by Gang of Four (Erich Gamma, Richard Helm, Ralph Johnson and John Vlissides),  a seminal work in object-oriented software design and development that changed the way how we think and solve software implementation problems. In simpler terms., Design patterns is all about adopting to proven solutions… Read more »

Wire-speed Cryptography for SOA Security and Compliance

I admit that I am not a SOA expert or pretend to be one !  Lately, I had a chance to explore few security features intended for securing XML Web Services and Java EE applications. With my little knowledge to SOA, I found that XML Web services play a vital role in SOA to enable loosely-coupled services and ensuring interoperability. From a security perspective, the core foundation… Read more »

Unleashing SSL Acceleration and Reverse-Proxying with Kernel SSL (KSSL)

Last few weeks, I have been pulled into an interesting gig for demonstrating security for _____  SOA/XML Web Services and Java EE applications…. so I had a chance to play with some untold security features of Solaris 10. KSSL is one of the unsung yet powerful security features of Solaris 10.  As the name identifies, KSSL is a Solaris Kernel Module that… Read more »

Exploring Logical Access Control with PIV cards

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Looks like convergence projects are in the limelight… lately I noticed a lot of interests on enabling the use of common credentials for securely accessing physical and logical resources.  Although we find most convergence projects are targeted at the enterprise level but there are serious minds working on using smartcard based PKI credentials for supporting citizen-scale projects (I regret that… Read more »