If you need the user's password in plaintext (or something easily derived from it), then your authentication scheme shouldn't send it over the network at all: t

If you need the user's password in plaintext (or something easily derived from it), then your authentication scheme shouldn't send it over the network at all: there are better ways to handle that scenario. Also keep in mind that a machine storing plaintext passwords has the same security requirements as a Kerberos KDC, and those requirements are very, very high. Don't do this unless you know what you're doing, and even if you do, you should seriously consider a different scheme (or just using Kerberos itself: they've already gotten things right, so you don't have to risk getting things wrong).