Error reading configuration file for JAAS Authentication Provider in Spring

Question

Really ripping my hair out on this one. I have a JAAS Authentication Provider configured for my Spring webapp. I've created a bean definition for it as follows:

 <beans:bean id="jaasAuthenticationProvider"
     class="org.springframework.security.providers.jaas.JaasAuthenticationProvider">
    <custom-authentication-provider />
    <beans:property name="loginConfig" value="file:webapps/mywebapp/WEB-INF/login.conf"/>
    <beans:property name="loginContextName" value="myWebapp"/>
    <beans:property name="callbackHandlers">
       <beans:list>
          <beans:bean class="org.springframework.security.providers.jaas.JaasNameCallbackHandler"/>
          <beans:bean class="org.springframework.security.providers.jaas.JaasPasswordCallbackHandler"/>
       </beans:list>
    </beans:property>
 </beans:bean>

My login.conf file for JAAS:

myWebapp {
    com.sun.security.auth.module.Krb5LoginModule 
    required  
    doNotPrompt=false
    useTicketCache=true
    debug=true;
};

com.sun.security.jgss.initiate {
    com.sun.security.auth.module.Krb5LoginModule 
    required;
};

When Spring initializes, it configures the bean correctly. When I attempt to log into my webapp, however, I get the following error:

DEBUG webapp.AuthenticationProcessingFilter - Authentication request failed: org.springframework.security.AuthenticationServiceException: I/O error while reading configuration file.; nested exception is javax.security.auth.login.LoginException: I/O error while reading configuration file.

I can't find this error message anywhere in the Spring source code, and the error message itself is not helpful at all. Any idea what could be causing this?

Answer 1

Put your file on the classpath rather then trying to read it from the WEB-INF directory. /webapps/myapp/WEB-INF/classes/login.conf - then in your Spring config change the line to:

    <beans:property name="loginConfig" value="classpath:login.conf"/>

I don't think you are getting a Spring error, but getting a filesystem/java error, you are not allowed to read from the directory WEB-INF.

Answer 2

Found the answer. JAAS was actually loading the configuration file correctly, but I was missing a krb5.conf file in my local JDK. This file must live in:

$JAVA_HOME/lib/security

Example:

[libdefaults]
  default_realm = DOMAIN.NET
  dns_lookup_kdc = true

[domain_realm]
  .domain.net = DOMAIN.NET

where domain.net is the name of the Kerberos domain, and DOMAIN.NET is the same only capitalized.