compare username token password and digest in constant time#3182
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coheigea merged 1 commit intoJun 4, 2026
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(cherry picked from commit a4b17ea)
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reading through STSStaxTokenValidator i noticed the local UsernameToken path checks the client-supplied password and password digest with String.equals, which bails out at the first mismatching character. that timing difference looks like enough to recover the expected digest (for a chosen nonce/created) or the plaintext password byte by byte and then authenticate. routed both comparisons through MessageDigest.isEqual over utf-8 bytes, which is the constant-time idiom already used elsewhere in cxf (OAuthUtils.compareTokens, HmacJwsSignatureVerifier). also made it null-safe so a missing password value just fails authentication instead of throwing.