Just an anfter thought. If you subclass realm and genericprincpal and add a principal.getSubject() method then return the origional subject. Then you can get it from ((MYPrincipal)request.getPrincipal()).getSubject() This is what jboss appear to have done. so if you happen to have authenticated an instanceof JBossGenericPrincipal you can call getSubject View the original post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&p=3957596#... Reply to the post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=posting&mode=reply&a...