Securing Passwords in settings.xml (MNG-553)

Goal

Provide a way for securing passwords in settings.xml, instead of just storing it in plain text.

Design

1. Password Obfuscation
   1. Provide a plugin which a user can use to obfuscate their passwords and use this generated secured password in their settings.xml file.
   2. Implement reading of obfuscated passwords in Maven (plexus? or maven-core?)
      • add a flag/parameter to enable the use of obfuscated passwords in Maven during the build. Add an <obfuscation> parameter in the settings.xml, as suggested by Benjamin (see comment below). In this case, Maven would check first the value of this parameter and perform un-obfuscation to the password if specified.
      • or, use a keyword prepended to the password to tell Maven that the password is obfuscated (like what Jetty does). For example, <password>OBF:securedPassword</password> with 'OBF:' as the keyword.
   3. Prompt for a password if none is found in the settings.xml. Use a parameter like the --non-interactive flag of the maven-release-plugin in order to disable this. (Already handled by Wagon as pointed out by Brett)
2. Password Encryption
   1. ...

Consideration(s)

Aside from obfuscating passwords, encryption and checksums can also be used for securing passwords like how it is implemented in Jetty. See reference below.

References

Securing Passwords in Jetty