The presentation will provide an introduction to GeoServer own authentication and authorization subsystems. We’ll cover the supported authentication protocols, such as from basic/digest authentication and CAS support, check through the various identity providers, such as local config files, database tables and LDAP servers, and how it’s possible to combine the various bits in a single comprehensive authentication tool, as well as providing examples of custom authentication plugins for GeoServer, integrating it in a home grown security architecture. We’ll then move on to authorization, describing the GeoServer pluggable authorization mechanism and comparing it with proxy based solution, and check the built in service and data security system, reviewing its benefits and limitations. Finally we’ll explore the advanced authentication provider, GeoFence, explore the levels on integration with GeoServer, from the simple and seamless direct integration to the more sophisticated external setup, and see how it can provide GeoServer with complex authorization rules over data and OGC services, taking into account the current user, OGC request and requested layers to enforce spatial filters and alphanumeric filters, attribute selection as well as cropping raster data to areas of interest.
5. The filter chains
Different chains for different URL groups
Each chain authenticates in a different way by
composigin different filters
6. UI chain, with form, HTTP session (creation
allowed), and remember me services
OGC one, lighter, will use session if available,
no creation
Different usage, different chain
7. Available auth filters
Gathering user credentials (and eventually invoking
authentication providers chain)
Basic
Form
Digest
Anonymous (always the last)
Preauthentication (and eventually load user details from
user/group and/or role service)
Session
HTTP Header
X.509
Remember Me
J2EE
Easy to implement and plug new filters
Missing: authenticate from environment variables (e.g. Shibboleth SSO)
8. Authentication providers
Given credentials pulled from the filters, who
is the user?
Search in
user/group
database
Auth as a
LDAP user
Auth as a
DBMS user
XML DBMS
tables
Authentication
providers
User/Group
service
Pluggable
9. Role providers
Given the user, what are her roles in
GeoServer?
Fundamental, authorization is role based
Extensible, new providers can be built
LDAP DBMS XMLDBMS
tables
10. Extensions
CAS (https://www.apereo.org/cas): Single Sign On
integration
Authkey: simple UUID to user mapper
Simple key in the URL (must use HTTPS)
Allows authentication unware clients to participate
Pluggable: possibility to define custom mappers (e.g.
webservices)
URLMangler to add authkey to OGC request transparently (via
GetCapabilities)
12. Authorization
Given the user and her roles
Can the current «action» on the current «resource»
be allowed?
Action:
Generic read/write
Specific OGC service/method call
Resource
Workspace
Layer
Layer Group
Style
13. ResourceAccessManager
Pluggable interface, multiple implementations
Define AccessLimits for the various Catalog
Resources (Workspace, Layer, Style, LayerGroup)
Can access the current request
(service/method/details)
Allows for fine grained limits
Attributes visible
Read filters (which features can be read)
Write filters (which features can be written)
Filters:
Alphanumeric
Temporal
Spatial
14. Implementations
Default security subsystem
Simple per workspace/layer authentication
GeoFence
External application or embedded as a plugin
Full use of ResourceAccessManager abilities
Other custom implementations
Integrate with existing in-house authorization
mechanism
Quite popular in large enterprise setup
20. GeoFence rules
Authorizations are expressed as a
priority-based rule set:
Type of Rules are ALLOW/DENY/LIMIT
The first matching rule is the one that determines
the outcome of the auth request
21. GeoFence rules matching
Rules are matched based on:
Username
Group the provided user belongs to
GeoServer Instance (single GeoFence
multiple GS clusters)
OGC Service (e.g., WMS)
OGC Service Operation (e.g., GetFeatureInfo)
Workspace (E.g. it.geosolutions)
Layer name (E.g. topp:states)
22. Example
Example
Let’s assume we have configured these rules :
User:u1, Service:WMS, Workspace:W1, ALLOW
User:u1, DENY
These rules will grant access for user u1 to
all the layers in worspace W1
only for WMS requests
All other types of requests will be DENIED.
23. Restrictions (LIMIT rules)
When an ALLOW rule is matched, the user will
have access to the requested resource:
Restrictions on available area
Restrictions on alphanumeric
conditions
25. Stand-alone GeoFence
Geofence Probe
(ResourceAccessManager)
calls stand-alone GeoFence REST
services
A cache is setup to minimize network
traffic
A cache can be configured on
different aspects: number of entries,
expiration time
The cache provides REST operations
(using GeoServer’s own REST
dispatcher) in order to
Invalidate the cache
Query the cache statistics
26. GeoFence REST API
REST interface for administration automation
Complete CRUD access to the various entities
managed by GeoFence:
Users and groups
GeoServer instances
Rules
Paging support
Priority ordering in rules is fundamental: different ways
to insert and set a position for the new rules
Batch mode, backup and restore available
See details at:
https://github.com/geosolutions-it/geofence/wiki/REST-API
28. GeoFence integration
Simple setups demand simple solution
Have GeoFence run inside GeoServer
Integration similar to GWC one, runs like a plugin
GeoServer GeoWebCache
GeoFence
Rules DB
29. Baby steps
Born as a more future-proof alternative to improving
the internal security subsystem
Community module, available via nightly builds
Delivers a subset of the full functionality:
access/deny/limit based on mix of
roles/user/layer/workspace/service/request
Integrated UI
38. TODO
Allow to edit LIMIT rules
Force default style
Limit attributes
Filter contents
Control writes at the rule level
Better/Easier way to re-order rules between pages
(drag and drop can be used on the same page)
Migrate old security system rules to GeoFence as
possible