The product compares object references instead of the contents of the objects themselves, preventing it from detecting equivalent objects.
For example, in Java, comparing objects using == usually produces deceptive results, since the == operator compares object references rather than values; often, this means that using == for strings is actually comparing the strings' references, not their values.
Threat Mapped score: 0.0
Industry: Finiancial
Threat priority: Unclassified
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| Phase | Note |
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| Implementation | N/A |
Intro: In the example below, two Java String objects are declared and initialized with the same string values. An if statement is used to determine if the strings are equivalent.
Body: However, the if statement will not be executed as the strings are compared using the "==" operator. For Java objects, such as String objects, the "==" operator compares object references, not object values. While the two String objects above contain the same string values, they refer to different object references, so the System.out.println statement will not be executed. To compare object values, the previous code could be modified to use the equals method:
String str1 = new String("Hello"); String str2 = new String("Hello"); if (str1 == str2) { System.out.println("str1 == str2"); }Intro: In the following Java example, two BankAccount objects are compared in the isSameAccount method using the == operator.
Body: Using the == operator to compare objects may produce incorrect or deceptive results by comparing object references rather than values. The equals() method should be used to ensure correct results or objects should contain a member variable that uniquely identifies the object.
public boolean isSameAccount(BankAccount accountA, BankAccount accountB) { return accountA == accountB; }