There's a similar, although unrelated to Bytes, code just a few lines above:

https://github.com/hashgraph/hedera-services/blob/develop/hedera-node/hedera-network-admin-service-impl/src/main/java/com/hedera/node/app/service/networkadmin/impl/WritableFreezeStore.java#L69

Using == for comparing objects is an anti-pattern in Java. Introducing and (ab)using it in our code base establishes it as a "valid" pattern which engineers will keep repeating over and over, causing all sorts of bugs.

Please do replace any and all usages of == with calls to equals() when comparing any objects (and not only Bytes), unless it's a special case where a reference comparison must be performed by design, in which case it's mandatory to add a comment directly in code indicating that the usage of == in a particular line is by design and explain why.