This class provides a way for applications to keep secret information (like cryptographic keys) in an area of memory that is secure in the described ways.

• Installation
  • Currently supported / tested platforms
• Quick Start
• Goals
• Guarantees
• Protected Memory Implementation

• MacOS x86-64
• Linux x86-64

You can include SecureMemory in Java projects projects using Maven.

The Maven group ID is com.godaddy.asherah, and the artifact ID is securememory.

You can specify the current release of SecureMemory as a project dependency using the following configuration:

<dependencies>
  <dependency>
    <groupId>com.godaddy.asherah</groupId>
    <artifactId>securememory</artifactId>
    <version>0.1.0</version>
  </dependency>
</dependencies>

SecretFactory secretFactory = new ProtectedMemorySecretFactory();

try (Secret secretKey = secretFactory.createSecret(getSecretFromStore())) {
  secret.withSecretBytes(bytes -> {
    doSomethingWithSecretBytes(bytes);
  });
}

• Provide an interface which allows safe patterns of secrets usage
• Provide a handle for passing secrets around that doesn't expose the secret until it's actually used
• Minimize the lifetime of secrets in managed memory

Any implementation must have the following guarantees in so far as secret information stored in secure memory

• Values stored will not show up in core dumps
• Values stored will not be swapped
• Values stored will be securely / explicitly zeroed out when no longer in use

The protected memory implementation of secure memory:

• Uses mlock to lock the pages to prevent swapping
• Uses mprotect to mark the pages no-access until needed
• If the operating system supports it, uses madvise to disallow core dumps of protected regions
• If the operating system does not support madvise, uses setrlimit to disable core dumps entirely

• Add support for Cleaner rather than finalizer
• Add unit tests that generate core dumps and scan them for secrets (need to extract gcore source)
• If the operating system supports it, uses madvise to request that mapped pages be zeroed on exit