What is Spring Security and what are its top alternatives?
Spring Security is a powerful and customizable authentication and access control framework for Java applications built on the Spring framework. It provides comprehensive security features such as authentication, authorization, session management, and protection against common security vulnerabilities like CSRF and XSS. However, Spring Security can be complex to configure and master, making it challenging for beginners to set up.
Apache Shiro: Apache Shiro is a powerful and easy-to-use Java security framework that provides features like authentication, authorization, cryptography, and session management. Its simplicity and flexibility make it a popular alternative to Spring Security. Pros include a lightweight and easy-to-understand API, while cons may include fewer advanced features compared to Spring Security.
Keycloak: Keycloak is an open-source identity and access management platform that provides features like single sign-on, user federation, and social login integration. It offers extensive support for various authentication protocols and standards, making it a robust alternative to Spring Security. Pros include centralized user management and support for multi-tenancy, while cons may include a steeper learning curve for beginners.
Stormpath: Stormpath is a cloud-based user management API that simplifies user authentication and authorization in Java applications. It offers features like user registration, password reset, and social login integration. Pros include a developer-friendly API and scalability, while cons may include potential limitations in customization compared to Spring Security.
Micronaut Security: Micronaut Security is a secure and lightweight framework for building microservices and serverless applications in Java. It provides features like JWT authentication, role-based access control, and OAuth2 integration. Pros include fast startup time and low memory footprint, while cons may include a smaller community and resource pool compared to Spring Security.
Shiro-Authz: Shiro-Authz is a Spring-specific integration library that allows developers to leverage Apache Shiro's security features in Spring applications. It offers benefits like flexibility and ease of integration for developers already familiar with Apache Shiro. Pros include compatibility with existing Apache Shiro projects, while cons may include potential limitations in community support and documentation compared to Spring Security.
PicketLink: PicketLink is a robust identity management solution for Java applications that provides features like authentication, authorization, and federation. It offers support for various security protocols and standards, making it a versatile alternative to Spring Security. Pros include extensive documentation and support for complex security scenarios, while cons may include a complex setup process for beginners.
Cerberus: Cerberus is an open-source platform for securely storing and managing secrets like API keys, passwords, and certificates. It offers features like encryption, access control, and audit logging to protect sensitive information in Java applications. Pros include a focus on secrets management and security best practices, while cons may include a narrower scope compared to the comprehensive security features of Spring Security.
GuardSquare: GuardSquare is a comprehensive mobile application security platform that provides features like code obfuscation, encryption, and runtime protection. It helps secure Java applications against reverse engineering, tampering, and other security threats. Pros include advanced protection mechanisms and support for mobile security, while cons may include a specialized focus that may not cover all aspects of web application security like Spring Security.
CAS: CAS (Central Authentication Service) is a single sign-on solution that authenticates users across multiple websites or applications. It provides features like user authentication, ticket management, and proxy authentication. Pros include seamless single sign-on experience for users and support for enterprise-level deployments, while cons may include a specific focus on authentication that may not cover all aspects of access control and authorization like Spring Security.
Okta: Okta is a cloud-based identity management platform that provides features like single sign-on, user provisioning, and adaptive authentication. It helps secure Java applications by managing user identities and access controls. Pros include a user-friendly interface and extensive integrations with third-party services, while cons may include a reliance on cloud infrastructure that may not be suitable for all users compared to the flexibility of self-hosted solutions like Spring Security.
Top Alternatives to Spring Security
- Django
Django is a high-level Python Web framework that encourages rapid development and clean, pragmatic design. ...
- OAuth2
It is an authorization framework that enables a third-party application to obtain limited access to an HTTP service, either on behalf of a resource owner by orchestrating an approval interaction between the resource owner and the HTTP service, or by allowing the third-party application to obtain access on its own behalf. ...
- Keycloak
It is an Open Source Identity and Access Management For Modern Applications and Services. It adds authentication to applications and secure services with minimum fuss. No need to deal with storing users or authenticating users. It's all available out of the box. ...
- Auth0
A set of unified APIs and tools that instantly enables Single Sign On and user management to all your applications. ...
- JSON Web Token
JSON Web Token is an open standard that defines a compact and self-contained way for securely transmitting information between parties as a JSON object. This information can be verified and trusted because it is digitally signed. ...
- Amazon Cognito
You can create unique identities for your users through a number of public login providers (Amazon, Facebook, and Google) and also support unauthenticated guests. You can save app data locally on users’ devices allowing your applications to work even when the devices are offline. ...
- Firebase Authentication
It provides backend services, easy-to-use SDKs, and ready-made UI libraries to authenticate users to your app. It supports authentication using passwords, phone numbers, popular federated identity providers like Google, ...
- Devise
Devise is a flexible authentication solution for Rails based on Warden
Spring Security alternatives & related posts
- Rapid development670
- Open source487
- Great community424
- Easy to learn379
- Mvc276
- Beautiful code232
- Elegant223
- Free206
- Great packages203
- Great libraries194
- Restful79
- Comes with auth and crud admin panel79
- Powerful78
- Great documentation75
- Great for web71
- Python57
- Great orm43
- Great for api41
- All included32
- Fast28
- Web Apps25
- Easy setup23
- Clean23
- Used by top startups21
- Sexy19
- ORM19
- The Django community15
- Allows for very rapid development with great libraries14
- Convention over configuration14
- King of backend world11
- Full stack10
- Great MVC and templating engine10
- Fast prototyping8
- Mvt8
- Easy to develop end to end AI Models7
- Batteries included7
- Its elegant and practical7
- Have not found anything that it can't do6
- Very quick to get something up and running6
- Cross-Platform6
- Easy Structure , useful inbuilt library5
- Great peformance5
- Zero code burden to change databases5
- Python community5
- Map4
- Just the right level of abstraction4
- Easy to change database manager4
- Modular4
- Many libraries4
- Easy to use4
- Easy4
- Full-Text Search4
- Scaffold3
- Fastapi1
- Built in common security1
- Scalable1
- Great default admin panel1
- Node js1
- Gigante ta1
- Rails0
- Underpowered templating26
- Autoreload restarts whole server22
- Underpowered ORM22
- URL dispatcher ignores HTTP method15
- Internal subcomponents coupling10
- Not nodejs8
- Configuration hell8
- Admin7
- Not as clean and nice documentation like Laravel5
- Python4
- Not typed3
- Bloated admin panel included3
- Overwhelming folder structure2
- InEffective Multithreading2
- Not type safe1
related Django posts
Simple controls over complex technologies, as we put it, wouldn't be possible without neat UIs for our user areas including start page, dashboard, settings, and docs.
Initially, there was Django. Back in 2011, considering our Python-centric approach, that was the best choice. Later, we realized we needed to iterate on our website more quickly. And this led us to detaching Django from our front end. That was when we decided to build an SPA.
For building user interfaces, we're currently using React as it provided the fastest rendering back when we were building our toolkit. It’s worth mentioning Uploadcare is not a front-end-focused SPA: we aren’t running at high levels of complexity. If it were, we’d go with Ember.js.
However, there's a chance we will shift to the faster Preact, with its motto of using as little code as possible, and because it makes more use of browser APIs. One of our future tasks for our front end is to configure our Webpack bundler to split up the code for different site sections. For styles, we use PostCSS along with its plugins such as cssnano which minifies all the code.
All that allows us to provide a great user experience and quickly implement changes where they are needed with as little code as possible.
Hey, so I developed a basic application with Python. But to use it, you need a python interpreter. I want to add a GUI to make it more appealing. What should I choose to develop a GUI? I have very basic skills in front end development (CSS, JavaScript). I am fluent in python. I'm looking for a tool that is easy to use and doesn't require too much code knowledge. I have recently tried out Flask, but it is kinda complicated. Should I stick with it, move to Django, or is there another nice framework to use?
related OAuth2 posts
As the access to our global REST-API "Charon" is bound to OAuth2, we use Keycloak inside Quarkus to authenticate and authorize users of our API. It is not possible to perform any un-authenticated requests against this API, so we wanted to make really sure that the authentication/authorization component is absolutely reliable and tested. We found those attributes within Keycloak, so we used it.
My teammates and I are arguing on which library to use for our local and social authentication in our express app between OAuth2 and Passport. I went for Passport cause I personally like it, and it seems easier to implement with good docs, but some of my teammates think it's less secure than OAuth2. So any advice please would be appreciated. Thanks 🙏🏻
- It's a open source solution33
- Supports multiple identity provider24
- OpenID and SAML support17
- Easy customisation12
- JSON web token10
- Maintained by devs at Redhat6
- Okta7
- Poor client side documentation6
- Lack of Code examples for client side5
related Keycloak posts
Hello,
I'm trying to implement a solution for this situation:
There is a restaurant in which users can access RestAPI, using Google, Facebook, GitHub. There is even the possibility to login inside using the SPID authentication. In the first case I was considering Keycloak as a better solution for this case, but then i've read about Okta and its pros.
I cannot understand reading and searching on Google if SPID authentication is supported by OKTA. Looks like to be, because it should be using SAML, but I haven't found a clear solution.
As the access to our global REST-API "Charon" is bound to OAuth2, we use Keycloak inside Quarkus to authenticate and authorize users of our API. It is not possible to perform any un-authenticated requests against this API, so we wanted to make really sure that the authentication/authorization component is absolutely reliable and tested. We found those attributes within Keycloak, so we used it.
Auth0
- JSON web token69
- Integration with 20+ Social Providers31
- It's a universal solution20
- SDKs20
- Amazing Documentation15
- Heroku Add-on11
- Enterprise support8
- Great Sample Repos7
- Extend platform with "rules"7
- Azure Add-on4
- Easy integration, non-intrusive identity provider3
- Passwordless3
- It can integrate seamlessly with firebase2
- Great documentation, samples, UX and Angular support2
- Polished2
- On-premise deployment2
- Will sign BAA for HIPAA-compliance1
- MFA1
- Active Directory support1
- Springboot1
- SOC21
- SAML Support1
- Great support1
- OpenID Connect (OIDC) Support1
- Pricing too high (Developer Pro)15
- Poor support7
- Rapidly changing API4
- Status page not reflect actual status4
related Auth0 posts
Hi Otensia! I'd definitely recommend using the skills you've already got and building with JavaScript is a smart way to go these days. Most platform services have JavaScript/Node SDKs or NPM packages, many serverless platforms support Node in case you need to write any backend logic, and JavaScript is incredibly popular - meaning it will be easy to hire for, should you ever need to.
My advice would be "don't reinvent the wheel". If you already have a skill set that will work well to solve the problem at hand, and you don't need it for any other projects, don't spend the time jumping into a new language. If you're looking for an excuse to learn something new, it would be better to invest that time in learning a new platform/tool that compliments your knowledge of JavaScript. For this project, I might recommend using Netlify, Vercel, or Google Firebase to quickly and easily deploy your web app. If you need to add user authentication, there are great examples out there for Firebase Authentication, Auth0, or even Magic (a newcomer on the Auth scene, but very user friendly). All of these services work very well with a JavaScript-based application.
Hey all, We're currently weighing up the pros & cons of using Firebase Authentication vs something more OTB like Auth0 or Okta to manage end-user access management for a consumer digital content product. From what I understand so far, Something like Firebase Auth would require more dev effort but is likely to cost less overall, whereas OTB, you have a UI-based console which makes config by non-technical business users easier to manage. Does anyone else have any intuitions or experiences they could share on this, please? Thank you!
related JSON Web Token posts
Repost
Overview: To put it simply, we plan to use the MERN stack to build our web application. MongoDB will be used as our primary database. We will use ExpressJS alongside Node.js to set up our API endpoints. Additionally, we plan to use React to build our SPA on the client side and use Redis on the server side as our primary caching solution. Initially, while working on the project, we plan to deploy our server and client both on Heroku . However, Heroku is very limited and we will need the benefits of an Infrastructure as a Service so we will use Amazon EC2 to later deploy our final version of the application.
Serverside: nodemon will allow us to automatically restart a running instance of our node app when files changes take place. We decided to use MongoDB because it is a non relational database which uses the Document Object Model. This allows a lot of flexibility as compared to a RDMS like SQL which requires a very structural model of data that does not change too much. Another strength of MongoDB is its ease in scalability. We will use Mongoose along side MongoDB to model our application data. Additionally, we will host our MongoDB cluster remotely on MongoDB Atlas. Bcrypt will be used to encrypt user passwords that will be stored in the DB. This is to avoid the risks of storing plain text passwords. Moreover, we will use Cloudinary to store images uploaded by the user. We will also use the Twilio SendGrid API to enable automated emails sent by our application. To protect private API endpoints, we will use JSON Web Token and Passport. Also, PayPal will be used as a payment gateway to accept payments from users.
Client Side: As mentioned earlier, we will use React to build our SPA. React uses a virtual DOM which is very efficient in rendering a page. Also React will allow us to reuse components. Furthermore, it is very popular and there is a large community that uses React so it can be helpful if we run into issues. We also plan to make a cross platform mobile application later and using React will allow us to reuse a lot of our code with React Native. Redux will be used to manage state. Redux works great with React and will help us manage a global state in the app and avoid the complications of each component having its own state. Additionally, we will use Bootstrap components and custom CSS to style our app.
Other: Git will be used for version control. During the later stages of our project, we will use Google Analytics to collect useful data regarding user interactions. Moreover, Slack will be our primary communication tool. Also, we will use Visual Studio Code as our primary code editor because it is very light weight and has a wide variety of extensions that will boost productivity. Postman will be used to interact with and debug our API endpoints.
Overview: To put it simply, we plan to use the MERN stack to build our web application. MongoDB will be used as our primary database. We will use ExpressJS alongside Node.js to set up our API endpoints. Additionally, we plan to use React to build our SPA on the client side and use Redis on the server side as our primary caching solution. Initially, while working on the project, we plan to deploy our server and client both on Heroku. However, Heroku is very limited and we will need the benefits of an Infrastructure as a Service so we will use Amazon EC2 to later deploy our final version of the application.
Serverside: nodemon will allow us to automatically restart a running instance of our node app when files changes take place. We decided to use MongoDB because it is a non relational database which uses the Document Object Model. This allows a lot of flexibility as compared to a RDMS like SQL which requires a very structural model of data that does not change too much. Another strength of MongoDB is its ease in scalability. We will use Mongoose along side MongoDB to model our application data. Additionally, we will host our MongoDB cluster remotely on MongoDB Atlas. Bcrypt will be used to encrypt user passwords that will be stored in the DB. This is to avoid the risks of storing plain text passwords. Moreover, we will use Cloudinary to store images uploaded by the user. We will also use the Twilio SendGrid API to enable automated emails sent by our application. To protect private API endpoints, we will use JSON Web Token and Passport. Also, PayPal will be used as a payment gateway to accept payments from users.
Client Side: As mentioned earlier, we will use React to build our SPA. React uses a virtual DOM which is very efficient in rendering a page. Also React will allow us to reuse components. Furthermore, it is very popular and there is a large community that uses React so it can be helpful if we run into issues. We also plan to make a cross platform mobile application later and using React will allow us to reuse a lot of our code with React Native. Redux will be used to manage state. Redux works great with React and will help us manage a global state in the app and avoid the complications of each component having its own state. Additionally, we will use Bootstrap components and custom CSS to style our app.
Other: Git will be used for version control. During the later stages of our project, we will use Google Analytics to collect useful data regarding user interactions. Moreover, Slack will be our primary communication tool. Also, we will use Visual Studio Code as our primary code editor because it is very light weight and has a wide variety of extensions that will boost productivity. Postman will be used to interact with and debug our API endpoints.
Amazon Cognito
- Backed by Amazon14
- Manage Unique Identities7
- Work Offline4
- MFA3
- Store and Sync2
- Free for first 50000 users1
- It works1
- Integrate with Google, Amazon, Twitter, Facebook, SAML1
- SDKs and code samples1
- Massive Pain to get working4
- Documentation often out of date3
- Login-UI sparsely customizable (e.g. no translation)2
- Docs are vast but mostly useless1
- MFA: there is no "forget device" function1
- Difficult to customize (basic-pack is more than humble)1
- Lacks many basic features1
- There is no "Logout" method in the API1
- Different Language SDKs not compatible1
- No recovery codes for MFA1
- Hard to find expiration times for tokens/codes1
- Only paid support1
related Amazon Cognito posts
I'm starting a new React Native project and trying to decide on an auth provider. Currently looking at Auth0 and Amazon Cognito. It will need to play nice with a Django Rest Framework backend.
- Completely Free12
- Native App + Web integrations8
- Email/Password8
- Passwordless7
- Works seemlessly with other Firebase Services6
- Integration with OAuth Providers5
- Anonymous Users4
- Easy to Integrate and Manage4
- MFA1
- Heavy webpack6
related Firebase Authentication posts
Hi Otensia! I'd definitely recommend using the skills you've already got and building with JavaScript is a smart way to go these days. Most platform services have JavaScript/Node SDKs or NPM packages, many serverless platforms support Node in case you need to write any backend logic, and JavaScript is incredibly popular - meaning it will be easy to hire for, should you ever need to.
My advice would be "don't reinvent the wheel". If you already have a skill set that will work well to solve the problem at hand, and you don't need it for any other projects, don't spend the time jumping into a new language. If you're looking for an excuse to learn something new, it would be better to invest that time in learning a new platform/tool that compliments your knowledge of JavaScript. For this project, I might recommend using Netlify, Vercel, or Google Firebase to quickly and easily deploy your web app. If you need to add user authentication, there are great examples out there for Firebase Authentication, Auth0, or even Magic (a newcomer on the Auth scene, but very user friendly). All of these services work very well with a JavaScript-based application.
Hey all, We're currently weighing up the pros & cons of using Firebase Authentication vs something more OTB like Auth0 or Okta to manage end-user access management for a consumer digital content product. From what I understand so far, Something like Firebase Auth would require more dev effort but is likely to cost less overall, whereas OTB, you have a UI-based console which makes config by non-technical business users easier to manage. Does anyone else have any intuitions or experiences they could share on this, please? Thank you!
- Reliable33
- Open Source17
- Support for neo4j database4
- Secure2
related Devise posts
We use OmniAuth with Devise to authenticate users via Twitter, GitHub, Bitbucket and Gitlab. Adding a new OmniAuth authentication provider is basically as easy as adding a new Ruby gem!
The only drawback I could see is that your OmniAuth+Devise OmniauthCallbacksController
redirection logic can easily get hairy over time. So you have to be vigilant to keep it in check.