Inverno Framework Permission-based Access Control Guide

This guide directly follows the Inverno Framework Web Application Security Guide. In this guide you will continue protecting the Inverno Ticket application using permission-based access control to provide finer access control to services and resources.

The objective is to be able to control the access to particular services or resources based on the permissions that have been granted to users and stored in a Redis data store.

The complete Inverno Ticket application can be found in GitHub.

Step 1: Resolve a Permission-based access controller

In order to control whether a user authenticated in the ticket application has access to a particular service or resource, an AccessController must be present in the SecurityContext. Following the Inverno security model, an entity accessing an application can be authenticated, maybe identified and it may be possible to control its access based on more complex approaches such as role-based or permissions-based access control. It might then not always be possible to get an access controller, this greatly depends on the authentication process and how the application is architectured.

A PermissionBasedAccessController allows to determine whether an authenticated entity has a particular permissions in a particular context. The fact that the current functional context is considered when evaluating permissions provides even finer access control than roles or simple permissions. The Inverno security module provides the ConfigurationSourcePermissionBasedAccessController implementation which relies on a ConfigurationSource to resolve such parameterized permissions.

The unified configuration API is extremely powerful and can be used in many use cases including permission-based access control since it supports parameterized configuration properties which is exactly what is needed here.

The Inverno Ticket application already uses a Redis data store for authentication, a RedisConfigurationSource can then be used to manage user permissions.

So the first thing to do is to resolve a PermissionBasedAccessController using a ConfigurationSourcePermissionBasedAccessControllerResolver. This must be done in the SecurityConfigurer, the SecurityContext and the InterceptingSecurityContext declared respectively in WebRoutesConfigurer and WebInterceptorsConfigurer should now be defined with a PermissionBasedAccessController, the RedisClient should be injected to create the underlying RedisConfigurationSource and a ConfigurationSourcePermissionBasedAccessControllerResolver should be used in the SecurityInterceptor to resolve the access controller:

package io.inverno.app.ticket.internal.security;

...
import io.inverno.mod.configuration.source.RedisConfigurationSource;
import io.inverno.mod.redis.RedisClient;
import io.inverno.mod.security.accesscontrol.ConfigurationSourcePermissionBasedAccessControllerResolver;
import io.inverno.mod.security.accesscontrol.PermissionBasedAccessController;
...

@WebRoutes({
    @WebRoute(path = { "/login" }, method = { Method.GET }),
    @WebRoute(path = { "/login" }, method = { Method.POST }),
    @WebRoute(path = { "/logout" }, method = { Method.GET }, produces = { "application/json" }),
})
@Bean( visibility = Bean.Visibility.PRIVATE )
public class SecurityConfigurer implements WebRoutesConfigurer<SecurityContext<PersonIdentity, PermissionBasedAccessController>>, WebInterceptorsConfigurer<InterceptingSecurityContext<PersonIdentity, PermissionBasedAccessController>>, ErrorWebRouterConfigurer<ExchangeContext> {

    ...
    private final RedisConfigurationSource permissionsSource;

    public SecurityConfigurer(UserRepository<PersonIdentity, User<PersonIdentity>> userRepository, JWSService jwsService, RedisClient<String, String> redisClient) {
        this.userRepository = userRepository;
        this.jwsService = jwsService;
        this.permissionsSource = new RedisConfigurationSource(redisClient).withDefaultingStrategy(DefaultingStrategy.wildcard());
        this.permissionsSource.setKeyPrefix("SEC");
    }

    @Override
    public void configure(WebRoutable<SecurityContext<PersonIdentity, PermissionBasedAccessController>, ?> routes) {
        ...
    }

    @Override
    public void configure(WebInterceptable<InterceptingSecurityContext<PersonIdentity, PermissionBasedAccessController>, ?> interceptors) {
        interceptors
            .intercept()
                ...
                .interceptors(List.of(
                    SecurityInterceptor.of(
                        new CookieTokenCredentialsExtractor(),
                        new JWSAuthenticator<UserAuthentication<PersonIdentity>>(
                            this.jwsService,
                            Types.type(UserAuthentication.class).type(PersonIdentity.class).and().build()
                        )
                        .failOnDenied()
                        .map(jwsAuthentication -> jwsAuthentication.getJws().getPayload()),
                        new UserIdentityResolver<>(),
                        new ConfigurationSourcePermissionBasedAccessControllerResolver(this.permissionsSource)
                    ),
                    AccessControlInterceptor.authenticated()
                ));
    }
    ...
}

In order to facilitate the definition of permissions, the DefaultingStrategy.wildcard() has been applied to the RedisConfigurationSource. This basically allows to support defaulting when evaluating permissions, it is then possible to define default permissions that can be overridden in specific contexts, depending on how permissions are evaluated we can imagine having a user that can update all tickets except one specific ticket or the opposite.

The configuration source is also configured to use the SEC prefix to differentiates permissions keys from other entries (e.g. configuration entries) in the Redis data store.

Note that it is important to define PermissionBasedAccessController in both WebRoutesConfigurer and WebInterceptorsConfigurer. Since the InterceptingSecurityContext also extends the SecurityContext, they cannot be defined with different bounds and the compilation will fail with inconsistent context types errors when this happens. It is also interesting to notice that it is not required to change this in the SecurityController since bounds could have been declared using upper wildcards (i.e. SecurityContext<? extends PersonIdentity, ? extends AccessController>) which is perfectly fine. Please consult the reference documentation to better understand how the exchange context is generated when defining multiple Web configurers and Web controllers.

A PermissionBasedAccessController should now be present in the SecurityContext and accessible to subsequent interceptors and route handlers.

Step 2: Control access to services and resources

From there, you have two ways to control access to protected services and resources: you can do it globally in the SecurityConfigurer using a specific AccessControlInterceptor on specific routes or you can directly use the PermissionBasedAccessController in route handlers. These basically cover two different use cases: the first approach allows to control access in a non-intrusive way by configuration whereas the other one allows to implement specific behaviours based on permissions in a particular context, access control takes then an active part in the functionality.

Considering permission-based access control, the global approach might be used to evaluate permissions with no particular context or with a global context, while the second approach allows to evaluate permissions in a precise functional context. In practice it is then possible to determine whether the authenticated entity can perform a particular action like an update on a particular resource (e.g. a document) depending on some specific properties of that resource or any other contextual parameter (e.g. document type, current user's location...).

Let's start by limiting the access to the /open-api/** routes to users with the access-api permission without considering any context. You can do this globally in the SecurityConfigurer by defining an access control interceptor:

package io.inverno.app.ticket.internal.security;

...
import io.inverno.mod.http.base.ForbiddenException;
...

@WebRoutes({
    @WebRoute(path = { "/login" }, method = { Method.GET }),
    @WebRoute(path = { "/login" }, method = { Method.POST }),
    @WebRoute(path = { "/logout" }, method = { Method.GET }, produces = { "application/json" }),
})
@Bean( visibility = Bean.Visibility.PRIVATE )
public class SecurityConfigurer implements WebRoutesConfigurer<SecurityContext<PersonIdentity, PermissionBasedAccessController>>, WebInterceptorsConfigurer<InterceptingSecurityContext<PersonIdentity, PermissionBasedAccessController>>, ErrorWebRouterConfigurer<ExchangeContext> {

    ...
    @Override
    public void configure(WebInterceptable<InterceptingSecurityContext<PersonIdentity, PermissionBasedAccessController>, ?> interceptors) {
        interceptors
            ...
            .intercept()
                .path("/open-api/**")
                .interceptor(AccessControlInterceptor.verify(securityContext -> securityContext.getAccessController()
                    .orElseThrow(() -> new ForbiddenException("Missing access controller"))
                    .hasPermission("access-api")
                ));
    }
    ...
}

With above configuration, only authenticated users with permission access-api should have access to open-api/** routes. Following Inverno security model, the PermissionBasedAccessController exposed in the SecurityContext is an Optional and ForbiddenException is thrown if it is empty resulting in a forbidden (403) response.

Now you can do more complex access control in the applicative code by defining a functional context when evaluating permissions. Let's say you want to control in which plan a user can push or remove a ticket, to do so you can evaluate permissions push or remove in the context defined by the targeted plan.

You can do this by injecting the SecurityContext in pushTicket() and removeTicket() methods in PlanWebController:

package io.inverno.app.ticket.internal.rest.v1;

...
import io.inverno.mod.http.base.ForbiddenException;
import io.inverno.mod.security.accesscontrol.PermissionBasedAccessController;
import io.inverno.mod.security.http.context.SecurityContext;
import io.inverno.mod.security.identity.Identity;
...

@Bean( visibility = Bean.Visibility.PRIVATE )
@WebController( path = "/api/v1/plan" )
public class PlanWebController {

    ...
    @WebRoute( path = "/{planId}/ticket", method = Method.POST, consumes= MediaTypes.APPLICATION_X_WWW_FORM_URLENCODED )
    public Mono<Void> pushTicket(@PathParam long planId, @FormParam long ticketId, @FormParam Optional<Long> referenceTicketId, SecurityContext<? extends Identity, ? extends PermissionBasedAccessController> securityContext) {
        return securityContext.getAccessController()
            .orElseThrow(() -> new ForbiddenException("Missing access controller"))
            .hasPermission("push", "plan", Long.toString(planId))
                .flatMap(hasPermission -> {
                    if(!hasPermission) {
                        throw new ForbiddenException();
                    }
                    return referenceTicketId
                        .map(refTicketId -> this.planService.insertTicketBefore(planId, ticketId, refTicketId))
                        .orElse(this.planService.addTicket(planId, ticketId));
                });
    }

    @WebRoute( path = "/{planId}/ticket/{ticketId}", method = Method.DELETE, produces = MediaTypes.TEXT_PLAIN )
    public Mono<Long> removeTicket(@PathParam long planId, @PathParam long ticketId, SecurityContext<? extends Identity, ? extends PermissionBasedAccessController> securityContext) {
        return securityContext.getAccessController()
            .orElseThrow(() -> new ForbiddenException("Missing access controller"))
            .hasPermission("remove", "plan", Long.toString(planId))
            .flatMap(hasPermission -> {
                if(!hasPermission) {
                    throw new ForbiddenException();
                }
                return this.planService.removeTicket(planId, ticketId);
            });
    }
    ...
}

As you can see, it is quite easy to use the SecurityContext in pure applicative code and use it to access user's identity or control access. The expected Identity and AccessController types are also clearly specified in the Web configurers and the Web route handlers, defining a clear contract with the application. Inconsistent contexts can then easily be spotted during compilation and the application is required to provide the expected context types.

Step 3: Manage user permissions

When using a ConfigurationSourcePermissionBasedAccessController, permissions are defined as configuration properties in a ConfigurationSource, since you are using a RedisConfigurationSource which is a ConfigurableConfigurationSource, you can then use it to set user permissions in the Redis data store.

In order to keep things simple, let's just simply add an @Init method to the SecurityConfigurer and initialize permissions for user jsmith:

package io.inverno.app.ticket.internal.security;

...
import io.inverno.core.annotation.Init;
...

@WebRoutes({
    @WebRoute(path = { "/login" }, method = { Method.GET }),
    @WebRoute(path = { "/login" }, method = { Method.POST }),
    @WebRoute(path = { "/logout" }, method = { Method.GET }, produces = { "application/json" }),
})
@Bean( visibility = Bean.Visibility.PRIVATE )
public class SecurityConfigurer implements WebRoutesConfigurer<SecurityContext<PersonIdentity, PermissionBasedAccessController>>, WebInterceptorsConfigurer<InterceptingSecurityContext<PersonIdentity, PermissionBasedAccessController>>, ErrorWebRouterConfigurer<ExchangeContext> {

    ...
    @Init
    public void init() {
        this.permissionsSource.set("jsmith", "remove")
            .and()
            .set("jsmith", "*").withParameters("plan", "1")
            .execute()
            .blockLast();
    }
    ...
}

Permissions are defined for a specific user as properties with the username as name and a comma-separated list of permissions as values, * is used to grant all permissions. In above code, permission remove is granted to user jsmith whatever the context, this is the default set of permissions, and all permissions are granted when considering plan 1.

Note that permissions can also be granted to roles rather than users, a user with a given role inheriting its permissions.

Please refer to the security module in the reference documentation for more in-deph explanation on how permissions defaulting works and how they should be defined in a configuration source. From there, it is quite easy to imagine a user management UI targeting a UserRepository and a ConfigurableConfigurationSource exposed in a Web controller for managing both users and permissions .

if you look into the Redis data store you should be able to see how permissions are actually defined:

redis:6379> keys SEC:PROP*
1) "SEC:PROP:jsmith"
2) "SEC:PROP:jsmith[plan=\"1\"]"
winter-redis:6379> get "SEC:PROP:jsmith"
"\"remove\""
redis:6379> get "SEC:PROP:jsmith[plan=\"1\"]"
"\"*\""
winter-redis:6379> 

Step 4: Run the application

you should now be able to run and test the application:

$ docker run -d -p6379:6379 redis

$ mvn inverno:run
...
[INFO] --- inverno-maven-plugin:1.5.1:run (default-cli) @ inverno-ticket ---
[INFO] Running project: io.inverno.app.ticket@1.2.0-SNAPSHOT...
 [═══════════════════════════════════════════════ 100 % ══════════════════════════════════════════════] 
2022-08-12 11:57:45,750 INFO  [main] i.i.a.t.TicketApp - Active profile: default
2022-08-12 11:57:45,839 INFO  [main] i.i.c.v.Application - Inverno is starting...


     ╔════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╗
     ║                      , ~~ ,                                                                ║
     ║                  , '   /\   ' ,                                                            ║
     ║                 , __   \/   __ ,      _                                                    ║
     ║                ,  \_\_\/\/_/_/  ,    | |  ___  _    _  ___   __  ___   ___                 ║
     ║                ,    _\_\/_/_    ,    | | / _ \\ \  / // _ \ / _|/ _ \ / _ \                ║
     ║                ,   __\_/\_\__   ,    | || | | |\ \/ /|  __/| | | | | | |_| |               ║
     ║                 , /_/ /\/\ \_\ ,     |_||_| |_| \__/  \___||_| |_| |_|\___/                ║
     ║                  ,     /\     ,                                                            ║
     ║                    ,   \/   ,                                 -- 1.5.8 --                  ║
     ║                      ' -- '                                                                ║
     ╠════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╣
     ║ Java runtime        : OpenJDK Runtime Environment                                          ║
     ║ Java version        : 17.0.2+8-86                                                          ║
     ║ Java home           : /home/jkuhn/Devel/jdk/jdk-17.0.2                                     ║
     ║                                                                                            ║
     ║ Application module  : io.inverno.app.ticket                                                ║
     ║ Application version : 1.2.0-SNAPSHOT                                                       ║
     ║ Application class   : io.inverno.app.ticket.TicketApp                                      ║
     ║                                                                                            ║
     ║ Modules             :                                                                      ║
     ║  * ...                                                                                     ║
     ╚════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝


2022-08-12 11:57:45,846 INFO  [main] i.i.a.t.Ticket - Starting Module io.inverno.app.ticket...
2022-08-12 11:57:45,847 INFO  [main] i.i.m.b.Boot - Starting Module io.inverno.mod.boot...
2022-08-12 11:57:46,143 INFO  [main] i.i.m.b.Boot - Module io.inverno.mod.boot started in 296ms
2022-08-12 11:57:46,143 INFO  [main] i.i.m.r.l.Lettuce - Starting Module io.inverno.mod.redis.lettuce...
2022-08-12 11:57:46,186 INFO  [main] i.i.m.r.l.Lettuce - Module io.inverno.mod.redis.lettuce started in 43ms
2022-08-12 11:57:46,187 INFO  [main] i.i.m.s.j.Jose - Starting Module io.inverno.mod.security.jose...
2022-08-12 11:57:46,254 INFO  [main] i.i.m.s.j.Jose - Module io.inverno.mod.security.jose started in 67ms
2022-08-12 11:57:46,255 INFO  [main] i.i.m.w.Server - Starting Module io.inverno.mod.web.server...
2022-08-12 11:57:46,255 INFO  [main] i.i.m.h.s.Server - Starting Module io.inverno.mod.http.server...
2022-08-12 11:57:46,255 INFO  [main] i.i.m.h.b.Base - Starting Module io.inverno.mod.http.base...
2022-08-12 11:57:46,260 INFO  [main] i.i.m.h.b.Base - Module io.inverno.mod.http.base started in 5ms
2022-08-12 11:57:46,906 INFO  [main] i.i.m.h.s.i.HttpServer - HTTP Server (epoll) listening on http://0.0.0.0:8080
2022-08-12 11:57:46,907 INFO  [main] i.i.m.h.s.Server - Module io.inverno.mod.http.server started in 651ms
2022-08-12 11:57:46,907 INFO  [main] i.i.m.w.Server - Module io.inverno.mod.web.server started in 652ms
2022-08-12 11:57:46,911 INFO  [main] i.i.a.t.Ticket - Module io.inverno.app.ticket started in 1067ms
2022-08-12 11:57:46,912 INFO  [main] i.i.c.v.Application - Application io.inverno.app.ticket started in 1159ms

Now if you log in as jsmith, you should not be able to access the Swagger UI exposing the REST API at [http://localhost:8080/open-api] since user jsmith does not have permission access-api:

You can create two plans whose ids should be respectively 1 and 2, you should be able to create a ticket in plan 1:

But you should not be able to add this ticket to any other plan and in particular plan 2:

Congratulations! You've just used a Permission-based access controller to control access to an Inverno Web application.