99designs / 99designs/http-signatures-php

Reject messages with insufficient signed headers

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#56 0 comments 0 reactions 0 assignees View on GitHub
Dominant language
PHP
Stars
46
Forks
35
PR merge metrics
No merged PRs in 30d

Description

The server should be able to require the client to sign certain headers, and reject any messages in which these headers are unsigned.
For example, a server should be able to require a signed `digest` header for POST requests, and reject any message that doesn't have a signed digest header.

This protects against sloppy clients "leaving the door open": if a POST request with an unsigned digest is intercepted, the message body can be manipulated without invalidating the signature, and the forged message would be accepted.

This could be prevented by supplying a list of required headers to the constructors of the Verifier and Verification classes.
It might be useful to supply two sets of headers, one for requests without a body, and another for messages with a body. (Note that DELETE requests may or may not have a body).

For reference: https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc9421#verify-requirements

Contributor guide

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Research direction

Look at the Verifier and Verification classes to understand how signatures are currently validated. The RFC 9421 section on verification requirements outlines the logic for mandatory signed headers. Implement a way to pass required header lists into the constructors, handling the distinction between requests with and without a body. Test with POST requests having a digest header to ensure unsigned ones are rejected.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
php
Domain
backend-api-design, security
Issue type
Feature
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
45/100

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