Learn SPRING-SECURITY with Real Code Examples

Spring Security provides authentication, authorization, and protection against common security attacks.

Integrates seamlessly with Spring Boot and other Spring projects.

Supports declarative security via annotations and configuration.

Provides flexible authentication mechanisms including form login, OAuth2, JWT, and LDAP.

Highly extensible with filters, interceptors, and custom security logic.

Security filter chain for request interception

AuthenticationManager and Provider for auth logic

Method-level security with annotations

Declarative configuration via Java or XML

Password encoding and credential management

Authentication - verifying user identity

Authorization - granting access based on roles/permissions

SecurityContext - stores authenticated principal

Filter Chain - sequence of security filters for requests

PasswordEncoder - secure password storage and validation

src/main/java/.../security - security configuration and custom filters

src/main/java/.../service - user details service and authentication logic

src/main/java/.../controller - endpoints with access restrictions

application.properties/yml - security-related settings

pom.xml/gradle.build - dependency management

Define security configuration class

Configure authentication and authorization rules

Set up login, logout, and session management

Apply CSRF, CORS, and other protections

Test endpoints for proper access control

Beginner: in-memory user authentication

Intermediate: form login with database users

Advanced: JWT-based API authentication

Expert: OAuth2 SSO with custom token validation

Enterprise: multi-tenant, microservices security architecture

Spring Security vs Apache Shiro: Spring more integrated with Spring apps; Shiro simpler standalone

Spring Security vs Keycloak: Spring for framework-level security; Keycloak for full identity management

Spring Security vs JWT libraries alone: Spring adds filters, auth context, and more

Spring Security vs Express middleware: Spring Security more structured, Java-based

Spring Security vs OAuth2 library: Spring provides full ecosystem integration

2003 - Initial release by Ben Alex

2007 - Spring Security 2.x with core features

2011 - Spring Security 3.x adds annotation-based config

2016 - Spring Security 4.x integrates with Spring Boot

2023 - Spring Security 6.x with modern OAuth2/JWT support

Authentication - verifying user identity

Authorization - granting access based on roles/permissions

SecurityContext - stores authentication info per request/session

Filter Chain - sequence of filters for request processing

PasswordEncoder - utility for secure password storage