rack-attack/README.md
2013-07-12 14:49:29 -07:00

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# Rack::Attack!!!
*A DSL for blocking & throttling abusive clients*
Rack::Attack is a rack middleware to protect your web app from bad clients.
It allows *whitelisting*, *blacklisting*, *throttling*, and *tracking* based on arbitrary properties of the request.
Throttle state is stored in a configurable cache (e.g. `Rails.cache`), presumably backed by memcached or redis.
## Installation
Install the [rack-attack](http://rubygems.org/gems/rack-attack) gem; or add it to you Gemfile with bundler:
```ruby
# In your Gemfile
gem 'rack-attack'
```
Tell your app to use the Rack::Attack middleware.
For Rails 3 apps:
```ruby
# In config/application.rb
config.middleware.use Rack::Attack
```
Or for Rackup files:
```ruby
# In config.ru
use Rack::Attack
```
Optionally configure the cache store for throttling:
```ruby
Rack::Attack.cache.store = ActiveSupport::Cache::MemoryStore.new # defaults to Rails.cache
```
Note that `Rack::Attack.cache` is only used for throttling; not blacklisting & whitelisting. Your cache store must implement `increment` and `write` like [ActiveSupport::Cache::Store](http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActiveSupport/Cache/Store.html).
## How it works
The Rack::Attack middleware compares each request against *whitelists*, *blacklists*, *throttles*, and *tracks* that you define. There are none by default.
* If the request matches any **whitelist**, it is allowed.
* Otherwise, if the request matches any **blacklist**, it is blocked.
* Otherwise, if the request matches any **throttle**, a counter is incremented in the Rack::Attack.cache. If the throttle limit is exceeded, the request is blocked.
* Otherwise, all **tracks** are checked, and the request is allowed.
The algorithm is actually more concise in code: See [Rack::Attack.call](https://github.com/kickstarter/rack-attack/blob/master/lib/rack/attack.rb):
```ruby
def call(env)
req = Rack::Request.new(env)
if whitelisted?(req)
@app.call(env)
elsif blacklisted?(req)
blacklisted_response[env]
elsif throttled?(req)
throttled_response[env]
else
tracked?(req)
@app.call(env)
end
end
```
## About Tracks
`Rack::Attack.track` doesn't affect request processing. Tracks are an easy way to log and measure requests matching arbitrary attributes.
## Usage
Define whitelists, blacklists, throttles, and tracks as blocks that return truthy values if matched, falsy otherwise. In a Rails app
these go in an initializer in `config/initializers/`.
A [Rack::Request](http://rack.rubyforge.org/doc/classes/Rack/Request.html) object is passed to the block (named 'req' in the examples).
### Whitelists
```ruby
# Always allow requests from localhost
# (blacklist & throttles are skipped)
Rack::Attack.whitelist('allow from localhost') do |req|
# Requests are allowed if the return value is truthy
'127.0.0.1' == req.ip
end
```
### Blacklists
```ruby
# Block requests from 1.2.3.4
Rack::Attack.blacklist('block 1.2.3.4') do |req|
# Request are blocked if the return value is truthy
'1.2.3.4' == req.ip
end
# Block logins from a bad user agent
Rack::Attack.blacklist('block bad UA logins') do |req|
req.path == '/login' && req.post? && req.user_agent == 'BadUA'
end
```
#### Fail2Ban
`Fail2Ban.filter` can be used within a blacklist to block all requests from misbehaving clients.
This pattern is inspired by [fail2ban](http://www.fail2ban.org/wiki/index.php/Main_Page).
See the [fail2ban documentation](http://www.fail2ban.org/wiki/index.php/MANUAL_0_8#Jail_Options) for more details on
how the parameters work.
```ruby
# Block requests containing '/etc/password' in the params.
# After 3 blocked requests in 10 minutes, block all requests from that IP for 5 minutes.
Rack::Attack.blacklist('fail2ban pentesters') do |req|
# `filter` returns truthy value if request fails, or if it's from a previously banned IP
# so the request is blocked
Rack::Attack::Fail2Ban.filter(req.ip, :maxretry => 3, :findtime => 10.minutes, :bantime => 5.minutes) do
# The count for the IP is incremented if the return value is truthy.
CGI.unescape(req.query_string) =~ %r{/etc/passwd}
end
end
```
### Throttles
```ruby
# Throttle requests to 5 requests per second per ip
Rack::Attack.throttle('req/ip', :limit => 5, :period => 1.second) do |req|
# If the return value is truthy, the cache key for the return value
# is incremented and compared with the limit. In this case:
# "rack::attack:#{Time.now.to_i/1.second}:req/ip:#{req.ip}"
#
# If falsy, the cache key is neither incremented nor checked.
req.ip
end
# Throttle login attempts for a given email parameter to 6 reqs/minute
# Return the email as a discriminator on POST /login requests
Rack::Attack.throttle('logins/email', :limit => 6, :period => 60.seconds) do |req|
req.params['email'] if req.path == '/login' && req.post?
end
```
### Tracks
```ruby
# Track requests from a special user agent
Rack::Attack.track("special_agent") do |req|
req.user_agent == "SpecialAgent"
end
# Track it using ActiveSupport::Notification
ActiveSupport::Notifications.subscribe("rack.attack") do |name, start, finish, request_id, req|
if req.env['rack.attack.matched'] == "special_agent" && req.env['rack.attack.match_type'] == :track
Rails.logger.info "special_agent: #{req.path}"
STATSD.increment("special_agent")
end
end
```
## Responses
Customize the response of blacklisted and throttled requests using an object that adheres to the [Rack app interface](http://rack.rubyforge.org/doc/SPEC.html).
```ruby
Rack::Attack.blacklisted_response = lambda do |env|
# Using 503 because it may make attacker think that they have successfully
# DOSed the site. Rack::Attack returns 401 for blacklists by default
[ 503, {}, ['Blocked']]
end
Rack::Attack.throttled_response = lambda do |env|
# name and other data about the matched throttle
body = [
env['rack.attack.matched'],
env['rack.attack.match_type'],
env['rack.attack.match_data']
].inspect
# Using 503 because it may make attacker think that they have successfully
# DOSed the site. Rack::Attack returns 429 for throttling by default
[ 503, {}, [body]]
end
```
For responses that did not exceed a throttle limit, Rack::Attack annotates the env with match data:
```ruby
request.env['rack.attack.throttle_data'][name] # => { :count => n, :period => p, :limit => l }
```
## Logging & Instrumentation
Rack::Attack uses the [ActiveSupport::Notifications](http://api.rubyonrails.org/classes/ActiveSupport/Notifications.html) API if available.
You can subscribe to 'rack.attack' events and log it, graph it, etc:
```ruby
ActiveSupport::Notifications.subscribe('rack.attack') do |name, start, finish, request_id, req|
puts req.inspect
end
```
## Testing
A note on developing and testing apps using Rack::Attack - if you are using throttling in particular, you will
need to enable the cache in your development environment. See [Caching with Rails](http://guides.rubyonrails.org/caching_with_rails.html)
for more on how to do this.
## Performance
The overhead of running Rack::Attack is typically negligible (a few milliseconds per request),
but it depends on how many checks you've configured, and how long they take.
Throttles usually require a network roundtrip to your cache server(s),
so try to keep the number of throttle checks per request low.
If a request is blacklisted or throttled, the response is a very simple Rack response.
A single typical ruby web server thread can block several hundred requests per second.
Rack::Attack complements tools like `iptables` and nginx's [limit_zone module](http://wiki.nginx.org/HttpLimitZoneModule).
## Motivation
Abusive clients range from malicious login crackers to naively-written scrapers.
They hinder the security, performance, & availability of web applications.
It is impractical if not impossible to block abusive clients completely.
Rack::Attack aims to let developers quickly mitigate abusive requests and rely
less on short-term, one-off hacks to block a particular attack.
See also: the [Backing & Hacking blog post](http://www.kickstarter.com/backing-and-hacking/rack-attack-protection-from-abusive-clients) introducing Rack::Attack.
[![Build Status](https://travis-ci.org/kickstarter/rack-attack.png?branch=master)](https://travis-ci.org/kickstarter/rack-attack)
[![Code Climate](https://codeclimate.com/github/kickstarter/rack-attack.png)](https://codeclimate.com/github/kickstarter/rack-attack)
## License
Copyright (c) 2012 Kickstarter, Inc
Released under an [MIT License](http://opensource.org/licenses/MIT)