envoyproxy/envoy

Admin endpoint security

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#2,763 opened on Mar 8, 2018

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Description

The admin endpoint today is unsecured (no authentication or TLS), with the assumption that it is only available to localhost or accessible on a trusted network. Ideally:

  • We want to be able to restrict access to only trusted IPs, client certificates and ensure we have transport security.
  • We want to have some ability to distinguish roles and access to the admin console, i.e. distinct identities might be allowed to operate /quitquitquit vs. stats monitoring.

Beyond just security, there's also the question of what the admin console is. Is it just a curlable utility, an interactive web console or is it a first-class API intended for programatic use? Should it offer gRPC endpoints (in particular as we are moving towards a proto definition of its contents in places such as https://github.com/envoyproxy/envoy/issues/2172). Answers to this affect the framing of security considerations.

Opening this issue to start the design discussion here.

Contributor guide

Research direction
Investigate Envoy's existing admin endpoint code, TLS configuration, and authentication mechanisms. Review related issues and pull requests for design discussions.
Tech stack
cpp
Domain
backendsecurityinfrastructure
Issue type
Security
DifficultyEstimated implementation difficulty for a new contributor, from 1 for very small changes to 5 for expert-level work.
4
Estimated timeA rough time range for an experienced contributor to investigate, implement, test, and prepare a pull request.
1-2 days
Activity statusHow available the issue appears right now: fresh, active, stale, blocked, or waiting on maintainer input.
Active
ClarityHow clearly the issue explains the expected change, acceptance criteria, and next step.
Needs investigation
Prerequisites
C++Security conceptsEnvoy proxy internals
Newbie friendlinessA 1-100 score estimating how approachable this issue is for first-time contributors.
20