Java 7u4 webstart security exception: Class does not match trust level

java security java-7 java-web-start securityexception
Glstunna picture Glstunna · Jun 6, 2012 · Viewed 10.2k times · Source

We began to notice that with Java 7 (particularly with update 4), that all our users began to see this with our Webstart app:

[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) java.lang.SecurityException: class "CLASSNAME" does not match trust level of other classes in the same package
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at com.sun.deploy.security.CPCallbackHandler$ChildElement.checkResource(Unknown Source)
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at com.sun.deploy.security.DeployURLClassPath$JarLoader.checkResource(Unknown Source)
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at com.sun.deploy.security.DeployURLClassPath$JarLoader.getResource(Unknown Source)
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at com.sun.deploy.security.DeployURLClassPath.getResource(Unknown Source)
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at java.net.URLClassLoader$1.run(Unknown Source)
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at java.net.URLClassLoader$1.run(Unknown Source)
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(Unknown Source)
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at com.sun.jnlp.JNLPClassLoader.findClass(Unknown Source)
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(Unknown Source)
[14:42:58,422] AWT-EventQueue-0(DEBUG) at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(Unknown Source)...More

Where CLASSNAME = pretty much every class at random points from several jars in the app execution, breaking several behavior. If our users were to use Java 6, they have no problems! Just 7 (update 4). We sign ALL our jars, both the main application jar and it's library jars. i.e Users launching our webstart app see the blue shield instead of yellow or red.

This is obviously an issue as users are more frequently now upgrading to Java 7. I have tried to force our app to use Java 6 on the user machine either by using a previous installation(works), or installing a new one....with the j2se version="1.6" tag around resources but this causes it's own problems that would probably be best to make into it's own thread (the auto-jre-installation part).

Did Oracle break Webstart security with Java 7u4? How do I solve this securityexception issue?

Answer

Some One picture Some One · Nov 22, 2012

I had the same problem with 1.7.07: my webstart application failed randomly with the same error message while loading classes. I found a interesting workaround on this page oracle forums. The last answer describes a workaround for the problem (Java 6) - the reference to the Signature of the jars are hold as soft reference and these may be garbage collected, and this causes the error message. This can be adopted for Java 7 with some additional lines 

// Java 1.7
callNoArgMethod("getSigningData", jar);
makeHardLink("signingDataRef", jar);

Related questions

Java Error: "Your security settings have blocked a local application from running"

I'm trying to run this simple HelloWorld code written in Java from my browser (Chrome): public class HelloWorld extends JApplet { public void init() { try { SwingUtilities.invokeAndWait(new Runnable() { public void run() { JLabel lbl = new JLabel("Hello World"); add(lbl); } }); } catch (…

Read More
Why is char[] preferred over String for passwords?

In Swing, the password field has a getPassword() (returns char[]) method instead of the usual getText() (returns String) method. Similarly, I have come across a suggestion not to use String to handle passwords. Why does String pose a threat to …

Read More
How to retrieve a file from a server via SFTP?

I'm trying to retrieve a file from a server using SFTP (as opposed to FTPS) using Java. How can I do this?

Read More