What is the use of @EnableWebSecurity in spring

Question

As per spring docs

Add this annotation to an @Configuration class to have the Spring Security configuration defined in any WebSecurit

Answer 1

The Spring Boot Reference Guide explains well about it. If you search with @EnableWebSecurity:

To switch off the default web application security configuration completely you can add a bean with @EnableWebSecurity (this does not disable the authentication manager configuration or Actuator’s security). To customize it you normally use external properties and beans of type WebSecurityConfigurerAdapter (e.g. to add form-based login).

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If you add @EnableWebSecurity and also disable Actuator security, you will get the default form-based login for the entire application unless you add a custom WebSecurityConfigurerAdapter.

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If you define a @Configuration with @EnableWebSecurity anywhere in your application it will switch off the default webapp security settings in Spring Boot (but leave the Actuator’s security enabled). To tweak the defaults try setting properties in security.* (see SecurityProperties for details of available settings) and SECURITY section of Common application properties.

Apparently, it's to switch off the default web application security configuration and add your own.