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ska

Lets you easily sign data, using symmetric-key algorithm encryption. Allows you to validate signed data and identify possible validation errors. Uses sha-(1, 224, 256, 385 and 512)/hmac for signature encryption. Allows to use custom hash algorithms. Comes with shortcut functions for signing (and validating) dictionaries and URLs.

PyPI Version Supported Python versions Build Status Documentation Status GPL-2.0-only OR LGPL-2.1-or-later Coverage

Key concepts

Hosts, that communicate with each other, share the Secret Key, which is used to sign data (requests). Secret key is never sent around.

One of the cases is signing of HTTP requests. Each (HTTP) request is signed on the sender side using the shared Secret Key and as an outcome produces the triple (signature, auth_user, valid_until) which are used to sign the requests.

  • signature (str): Signature generated.
  • auth_user (str): User making the request. Can be anything.
  • valid_until (float or str): Signature expiration time (Unix timestamp).

On the recipient side, (HTTP request) data is validated using the shared Secret Key. It's being checked whether signature is valid and not expired.

┌─────────────┐           Data              ┌─────────────┐
│   Host 1    ├────────────────────────────>│   Host 2    │
│ ─────────── │                             │ ─────────── │
│ secret key  │                             │ secret key  │
│ 'my-secret' │<────────────────────────────┤ 'my-secret' │
└─────────────┘           Data              └─────────────┘

Features

Core ska module

  • Sign dictionaries.
  • Validate signed dictionaries.
  • Sign URLs. Append and sign additional URL data.
  • Validate URLs.
  • Use one of the built-in algorythms (HMAC SHA-1, HMAC SHA-224, HMAC SHA-256, HMAC SHA-384 or HMAC SHA-512) or define a custom one.

Django ska module (ska.contrib.django.ska)

  • Model decorators for signing absolute URLs. View (including class-based views) decorators for protecting views to authorised parties only (no authentication required).
  • Authentication backend for Django based on the signatures (tokens) generated using ska, which allows you to get a password-less login to Django web site. Multiple Secret Keys (per provider) supported. Comes with handy callbacks (possible to customise per provider) for various states of authentication.
  • Template tags for signing URLs from within templates.
  • django-constance integration (for password-less authentication).
  • Django REST Framework integration (for protecting ViewSets, obtaining JWT tokens for authentication).

Prerequisites

Present

  • Core ska module requires Python 3.8, 3.9, 3.10 and 3.11.
  • Django ska module (ska.contrib.django.ska) requires the mentioned above plus Django 3.2, 4.1 or 4.2. Additionally, certain versions of django-constance and djangorestframework are required. Specific version requirement primarily depends on the used Django version. Check the example requirements to find out which versions of django-constance and djangorestframework have been tested with specific Django versions.

Past

Note

In future releases (any time) compatibility with no-longer-supported versions might/will be wiped out.

  • Dropping support of Python 3.6 and 3.7 has been announced in version 1.10. As of 1.9.1 everything still worked.
  • Dropping support of Python 2.7 and 3.5 has been announced in version 1.8. As of 1.7.5 everything still worked.
  • Dropping support of Python 3.4 has been announced in version 1.6.8. As of 1.6.8 everything still worked.
  • Dropping support of Django 2.2, 3.0, 3.1 and 4.0 has been announced in version 1.10. As of 1.9.1 everything is still backwards compatible with mentioned versions.
  • Dropping support of Django 1.5, 1.6 and 1.7 has been announced in version 1.6. As of 1.6 everything is still backwards compatible with mentioned versions.
  • Dropping support of Python 2.6 and 3.3 has been announced in version 1.6. As of 1.6 everything is still backwards compatible (as much as it's possible within this package) with mentioned versions.

Eco-system

Need ska for other languages? Check the following affiliated projects:

  • skajs: ska implementation for NodeJS (both CommonJS and ESM are supported, Node >= 14).
  • skaphp: ska implementation for PHP (>= 7.2).

Generated signatures are inter-compatible between Python, NodeJS and PHP implementations.

Installation

Latest stable version from PyPI:

pip install ska

or latest development version from GitHub.

pip install https://github.com/barseghyanartur/ska/archive/main.tar.gz

Usage examples

For integration with Django, see the Django integration section.

Basic usage

Pure Python usage.

Sender side

Signing URLs is as simple as follows.

Required imports.

from ska import sign_url

Producing a signed URL.

signed_url = sign_url(
    auth_user='user',
    secret_key='your-secret_key',
    url='http://e.com/api/'
)
GET http://e.com/api/?valid_until=1378045287.0&auth_user=user&signature=YlZpLFsjUKBalL4x5trhkeEgqE8%3D

Default lifetime of a signature is 10 minutes (600 seconds). If you want it to be different, provide a lifetime argument to sign_url function.

Default name of the (GET) param holding the generated signature value is signature. If you want it to be different, provide a signature_param argument to sign_url function.

Default name of the (GET) param holding the auth_user value is auth_user. If you want it to be different, provide a auth_user_param argument to sign_url function.

Default name of the (GET) param holding the valid_until value is valid_until. If you want it to be different, provide a valid_until_param argument to sign_url function.

Note, that by default a suffix '?' is added after the given url and generated signature params. If you want that suffix to be custom, provide a suffix argument to the sign_url function. If you want it to be gone, set its' value to empty string.

With all customisations, it would look as follows:

from ska import HMACSHA512Signature  # Use HMAC SHA-512 algorithm

signed_url = sign_url(
    auth_user='user',
    secret_key='your-secret_key',
    lifetime=120,
    url='http://e.com/api/',
    signature_param='signature',
    auth_user_param='auth_user',
    valid_until_param='valid_until',
    signature_cls=HMACSHA512Signature
)

It's also possible to add additional data to the signature by providing a extra argument (dict). Note, that additional data is signed as well. If request is somehow tampered (values vary from originally provided ones), signature becomes invalid.

sign_url(
    auth_user='user',
    secret_key='your-secret_key',
    url='http://e.com/api/',
    extra={
        'email': 'doe@example.com',
        'last_name': 'Doe',
        'first_name': 'Joe'
    }
)

You may now proceed with the signed URL request. If you use the famous requests library, it would be as follows.

import requests
requests.get(signed_url)

If you want to use POST method instead, you would likely want to get a dictionary back, in order to append it to the POST data later.

Required imports.

from ska import signature_to_dict

Producing a dictionary containing the signature data, ready to be put into the request (for example POST) data. All customisations mentioned above for the sign_url function, also apply to the signature_to_dict:

signature_dict = signature_to_dict(
    auth_user='user',
    secret_key='your-secret_key'
)
{
    'signature': 'YlZpLFsjUKBalL4x5trhkeEgqE8=',
    'auth_user': 'user',
    'valid_until': '1378045287.0'
}

Adding of additional data to the signature works in the same way:

signature_dict = signature_to_dict(
    auth_user='user',
    secret_key='your-secret_key',
    extra={
        'email': 'john.doe@mail.example.com',
        'first_name': 'John',
        'last_name': 'Doe'
    }
)
{
    'auth_user': 'user',
    'email': 'john.doe@mail.example.com',
    'extra': 'email,first_name,last_name',
    'first_name': 'John',
    'last_name': 'Doe',
    'signature': 'cnSoU/LnJ/ZhfLtDLzab3a3gkug=',
    'valid_until': 1387616469.0
}

If you for some reason prefer a lower level implementation, read the same section in the Advanced usage (low-level) chapter.

Recipient side

Validating the signed request data is as simple as follows.

Required imports.

from ska import validate_signed_request_data

Validating the signed request data. Note, that data value is expected to be a dictionary; request.GET is given as an example. It will most likely vary from what's used in your framework (unless you use Django).

validation_result = validate_signed_request_data(
    data=request.GET,  # Note, that ``request.GET`` is given as example.
    secret_key='your-secret_key'
)

The validate_signed_request_data produces a ska.SignatureValidationResult object, which holds the following data.

  • result (bool): True if data is valid. False otherwise.
  • reason (list): List of strings, indicating validation errors. Empty list in case if result is True.

Default name of the (GET) param holding the signature value is signature. If you want it to be different, provide a signature_param argument to validate_signed_request_data function.

Default name of the (GET) param holding the auth_user value is auth_user. If you want it to be different, provide a auth_user_param argument to validate_signed_request_data function.

Default name of the (GET) param holding the valid_until value is valid_until. If you want it to be different, provide a valid_until_param argument to validate_signed_request_data function.

With all customisations, it would look as follows. Note, that request.GET is given as example.

from ska import HMACSHA256Signature  # Use HMAC SHA-256 algorithm

validation_result = validate_signed_request_data(
    data=request.GET,
    secret_key='your-secret_key',
    signature_param='signature',
    auth_user_param='auth_user',
    valid_until_param='valid_until',
    signature_cls=HMACSHA256Signature
)

If you for some reason prefer a lower level implementation, read the same section in the Advanced usage (low-level) chapter.

Command line usage

It's possible to generate a signed URL from command line using the ska.generate_signed_url module.

Arguments: 
-h, --help            show this help message and exit

-au AUTH_USER, --auth-user AUTH_USER
                      `auth_user` value

-sk SECRET_KEY, --secret-key SECRET_KEY
                      `secret_key` value

-vu VALID_UNTIL, --valid-until VALID_UNTIL
                      `valid_until` value

-l LIFETIME, --lifetime LIFETIME
                      `lifetime` value

-u URL, --url URL     URL to sign

-sp SIGNATURE_PARAM, --signature-param SIGNATURE_PARAM
                      (GET) param holding the `signature` value

-aup AUTH_USER_PARAM, --auth-user-param AUTH_USER_PARAM
                      (GET) param holding the `auth_user` value

-vup VALID_UNTIL_PARAM, --valid-until-param VALID_UNTIL_PARAM
                      (GET) param holding the `auth_user` value
Example: 
ska-sign-url -au user -sk your-secret-key --url http://example.com

Advanced usage (low-level)

Sender side

Required imports.

from ska import Signature, RequestHelper

Generate a signature.

signature = Signature.generate_signature(
    auth_user='user',
    secret_key='your-secret-key'
)

Default lifetime of a signature is 10 minutes (600 seconds). If you want it to be different, provide a lifetime argument to generate_signature method.

signature = Signature.generate_signature(
    auth_user='user',
    secret_key='your-secret-key',
    lifetime=120  # Signature lifetime set to 120 seconds.
)

Adding of additional data to the signature works in the same way as in sign_url.

signature = Signature.generate_signature(
    auth_user='user',
    secret_key='your-secret-key',
    extra={
        'email': 'doe@example.com',
        'last_name': 'Doe',
        'first_name': 'Joe'
    }
)

For HMAC SHA-384 algorithm it would look as follows.

from ska import HMACSHA384Signature

signature = HMACSHA384Signature.generate_signature(
    auth_user='user',
    secret_key='your-secret-key'
)

Your endpoint operates with certain param names and you need to wrap generated signature params into the URL. In order to have the job done in an easy way, create a request helper. Feed names of the (GET) params to the request helper and let it make a signed endpoint URL for you.

request_helper = RequestHelper(
    signature_param='signature',
    auth_user_param='auth_user',
    valid_until_param='valid_until'
)

Append signature params to the endpoint URL.

signed_url = request_helper.signature_to_url(
    signature=signature,
    endpoint_url='http://e.com/api/'
)
GET http://e.com/api/?valid_until=1378045287.0&auth_user=user&signature=YlZpLFsjUKBalL4x5trhkeEgqE8%3D

Make a request.

import requests
r = requests.get(signed_url)

For HMAC SHA-384 algorithm it would look as follows.

from ska import HMACSHA384Signature

request_helper = RequestHelper(
    signature_param='signature',
    auth_user_param='auth_user',
    valid_until_param='valid_until',
    signature_cls=HMACSHA384Signature
)

signed_url = request_helper.signature_to_url(
    signature=signature,
    endpoint_url='http://e.com/api/'
)

Recipient side

Required imports.

from ska import RequestHelper

Create a request helper. Your endpoint operates with certain param names. In order to have the job done in an easy way, we feed those params to the request helper and let it extract data from signed request for us.

request_helper = RequestHelper(
    signature_param='signature',
    auth_user_param='auth_user',
    valid_until_param='valid_until'
)

Validate the request data. Note, that request.GET is given just as an example.

validation_result = request_helper.validate_request_data(
    data=request.GET,
    secret_key='your-secret-key'
)

Your implementation further depends on you, but may look as follows.

if validation_result.result:
    # Validated, proceed further
    # ...
else:
    # Validation not passed.
    raise Http404(validation_result.reason)

You can also just validate the signature by calling validate_signature method of the ska.Signature.

Signature.validate_signature(
    signature='EBS6ipiqRLa6TY5vxIvZU30FpnM=',
    auth_user='user',
    secret_key='your-secret-key',
    valid_until='1377997396.0'
)

Django integration

ska comes with Django model- and view-decorators for producing signed URLs and and validating the endpoints, as well as with authentication backend, which allows password-less login into Django web site using ska generated signature tokens. There's also a template tag for signing URLs.

Demo

In order to be able to quickly evaluate the ska, a demo app (with a quick installer) has been created (works on Ubuntu/Debian, may work on other Linux systems as well, although not guaranteed). Follow the instructions below for having the demo running within a minute.

Grab the latest ska_example_app_installer.sh and execute it:

wget -O - https://raw.github.com/barseghyanartur/ska/stable/examples/ska_example_app_installer.sh | bash

Open your browser and test the app.

Foo listing (ska protected views):

Authentication page (ska authentication backend):

Django admin interface:

Configuration

Secret key (str) must be defined in settings module of your project.

SKA_SECRET_KEY = 'my-secret-key'

The following variables can be overridden in settings module of your project.

  • SKA_UNAUTHORISED_REQUEST_ERROR_MESSAGE (str): Plain text error message. Defaults to "Unauthorised request. {0}".
  • SKA_UNAUTHORISED_REQUEST_ERROR_TEMPLATE (str): Path to 401 template that should be rendered in case of 401 responses. Defaults to empty string (not provided).
  • SKA_AUTH_USER (str): The auth_user argument for ska.sign_url function. Defaults to "ska-auth-user".

See the working example project.

Multiple secret keys

Imagine, you have a site to which you want to offer a password-less login for various clients/senders and you don't want them all to have one shared secret key, but rather have their own one. Moreover, you specifically want to execute very custom callbacks not only for each separate client/sender, but also for different sort of users authenticating.

                          ┌────────────────┐
                          │ Site providing │
                          │ authentication │
                          │ ────────────── │
                          │ custom secret  │
                          │    keys per    │
                          │     client     │
                          │ ────────────── │
                          │ Site 1: 'sk-1' │
             ┌───────────>│ Site 2: 'sk-2' │<───────────┐
             │            │ Site 3: 'sk-3' │            │
             │      ┌────>│ Site 4: 'sk-4' │<────┐      │
             │      │     └────────────────┘     │      │
             │      │                            │      │
             │      │                            │      │
┌────────────┴─┐  ┌─┴────────────┐  ┌────────────┴─┐  ┌─┴────────────┐
│    Site 1    │  │    Site 2    │  │    Site 3    │  │    Site 4    │
│ ──────────── │  │ ──────────── │  │ ──────────── │  │ ──────────── │
│  secret key  │  │  secret key  │  │  secret key  │  │  secret key  │
│    'sk-1'    │  │    'sk-2'    │  │    'sk-3'    │  │    'sk-4'    │
└──────────────┘  └──────────────┘  └──────────────┘  └──────────────┘

In order to make the stated above possible, the concept of providers is introduced. You can define a secret key, callbacks or redirect URL. See an example below. Note, that keys of the SKA_PROVIDERS ("client_1", "client_2", etc.) are the provider keys.

SKA_PROVIDERS = {
    # ********************************************************
    # ******************** Basic gradation *******************
    # ********************************************************
    # Site 1
    'client_1': {
        'SECRET_KEY': 'sk-1',
    },

    # Site 2
    'client_2': {
        'SECRET_KEY': 'sk-2',
    },

    # Site 3
    'client_3': {
        'SECRET_KEY': 'sk-3',
    },

    # Site 4
    'client_4': {
        'SECRET_KEY': 'sk-4',
    },

    # ********************************************************
    # ******* You make gradation as complex as you wish ******
    # ********************************************************
    # Client 1, group users
    'client_1.users': {
        'SECRET_KEY': 'client-1-users-secret-key',
    },

    # Client 1, group power_users
    'client_1.power_users': {
        'SECRET_KEY': 'client-1-power-users-secret-key',
        'USER_CREATE_CALLBACK': 'foo.ska_callbacks.client1_power_users_create',
    },

    # Client 1, group admins
    'client_1.admins': {
        'SECRET_KEY': 'client-1-admins-secret-key',
        'USER_CREATE_CALLBACK': 'foo.ska_callbacks.client1_admins_create',
        'REDIRECT_AFTER_LOGIN': '/admin/'
    },
}

See the Callbacks section for the list of callbacks. Note, that callbacks defined in the SKA_PROVIDERS are overrides. If a certain callback isn't defined in the SKA_PROVIDERS, authentication backend falls back to the respective default callback function.

Obviously, server would have to have the full list of providers defined. On the client side you would only have to store the general secret key and of course the provider UID(s).

When making a signed URL on the sender side, you should be providing the provider key in the extra argument. See the example below for how you would do it for client_1.power_users.

from ska import sign_url
from ska.defaults import DEFAULT_PROVIDER_PARAM

server_ska_login_url = 'https://server-url.com/ska/login/'

signed_remote_ska_login_url = sign_url(
    auth_user='test_ska_user',
    # Using provider-specific secret key. This value shall be equal to
    # the value of SKA_PROVIDERS['client_1.power_users']['SECRET_KEY'],
    # defined in your projects' Django settings module.
    secret_key='client-1-power-users-secret-key',
    url=server_ska_login_url,
    extra={
        'email': 'test_ska_user@mail.example.com',
        'first_name': 'John',
        'last_name': 'Doe',
        # Using provider specific string. This value shall be equal to
        # the key string "client_1.power_users" of SKA_PROVIDERS,
        # defined in your projcts' Django settings module.
        DEFAULT_PROVIDER_PARAM: 'client_1.power_users',
    }
)

Django model method decorator sign_url

This is most likely be used in module models (models.py).

Imagine, you have a some objects listing and you want to protect the URLs to be viewed by authorised parties only. You would then use get_signed_absolute_url method when rendering the listing (HTML).

from django.db import models
from django.utils.translation import ugettext_lazy as _
from django.core.urlresolvers import reverse

from ska.contrib.django.ska.decorators import sign_url


class FooItem(models.Model):

    title = models.CharField(_("Title"), max_length=100)
    slug = models.SlugField(unique=True, verbose_name=_("Slug"))
    body = models.TextField(_("Body"))

    # Unsigned absolute URL, which goes to the foo item detail page.
    def get_absolute_url(self):
        return reverse('foo.detail', kwargs={'slug': self.slug})

    # Signed absolute URL, which goes to the foo item detail page.
    @sign_url()
    def get_signed_absolute_url(self):
        return reverse('foo.detail', kwargs={'slug': self.slug})

Note, that sign_url decorator accepts the following optional arguments.

  • auth_user (str): Username of the user making the request.
  • secret_key: The shared secret key. If set, overrides the SKA_SECRET_KEY variable set in the settings module of your project.
  • valid_until (float or str): Unix timestamp. If not given, generated automatically (now + lifetime).
  • lifetime (int): Signature lifetime in seconds.
  • suffix (str): Suffix to add after the endpoint_url and before the appended signature params.
  • signature_param (str): Name of the GET param name which would hold the generated signature value.
  • auth_user_param (str): Name of the GET param name which would hold the auth_user value.
  • valid_until_param (str): Name of the GET param name which would hold the valid_until value.

Django view decorator validate_signed_request

To be used to protect views (file views.py). Should be applied to views (endpoints) that require signed requests. If checks are not successful, a ska.contrib.django.ska.http.HttpResponseUnauthorized is returned, which is a subclass of Django's django.http.HttpResponse. You can provide your own template for 401 error. Simply point the SKA_UNAUTHORISED_REQUEST_ERROR_TEMPLATE in settings module to the right template. See ska/contrib/django/ska/templates/ska/401.html as a template example.

from ska.contrib.django.ska.decorators import validate_signed_request

# Your view that shall be protected
@validate_signed_request()
def detail(request, slug, template_name='foo/detail.html'):
    # Your code

Note, that validate_signed_request decorator accepts the following optional arguments.

  • secret_key (str) : The shared secret key. If set, overrides the SKA_SECRET_KEY variable set in the settings module of your project.
  • signature_param (str): Name of the (for example GET or POST) param name which holds the signature value.
  • auth_user_param (str): Name of the (for example GET or POST) param name which holds the auth_user value.
  • valid_until_param (str): Name of the (foe example GET or POST) param name which holds the valid_until value.

If you're using class based views, use the m_validate_signed_request decorator instead of validate_signed_request.

Template tags

There are two template tags modules: ska_tags and ska_constance_tags. They are functionally identical, although ska_constance_tags is tied to django-constance.

For standard settings configurations, template tags shall be loaded as follows:

{% load ska_tags %}

For django-constance based settings configurations, template tags shall be loaded as follows:

{% load ska_constance_tags %}

Note, that if you want to use ska_constance_tags, add the ska.contrib.django.ska.integration.constance_integration line to your``INSTALLED_APPS``:

INSTALLED_APPS = (
    # ...
    'ska.contrib.django.ska.integration.constance_integration',
    # ...
)
sign_url

The sign_url template tag accepts template context and the following params:

  • url
  • auth_user: If not given, request.user.get_username() is used.
  • secret_key: If not given, the secret key from settings is used.
  • valid_until: If not given, calculated from lifetime.
  • lifetime: Defaults to ska.defaults.SIGNATURE_LIFETIME.
  • suffix: Defaults to ska.defaults.DEFAULT_URL_SUFFIX.
  • signature_param: Defaults to ska.defaultsDEFAULT_SIGNATURE_PARAM.
  • auth_user_param: Defaults to ska.defaults.DEFAULT_AUTH_USER_PARAM.
  • valid_until_param: Defaults to ska.defaults.DEFAULT_VALID_UNTIL_PARAM.
  • signature_cls: Defaults to ska.signatures.Signature.

Usage example:

{% load ska_tags %}

{% for item in items%}

    {% sign_url item.get_absolute_url as item_signed_absolute_url %}
    <a href="{{ item_signed_absolute_url }}">{{ item }}</a>

{% endfor %}
provider_sign_url

The provider_sign_url template tag accepts template context and the following params:

  • url
  • provider: Provider name.
  • auth_user: If not given, request.user.get_username() is used.
  • valid_until: If not given, calculated from lifetime.
  • lifetime: Defaults to ska.defaults.SIGNATURE_LIFETIME.
  • suffix: Defaults to ska.defaults.DEFAULT_URL_SUFFIX.
  • signature_param: Defaults to ska.defaultsDEFAULT_SIGNATURE_PARAM.
  • auth_user_param: Defaults to ska.defaults.DEFAULT_AUTH_USER_PARAM.
  • valid_until_param: Defaults to ska.defaults.DEFAULT_VALID_UNTIL_PARAM.
  • signature_cls: Defaults to ska.signatures.Signature.
  • fail_silently: Defaults to False.

Usage example:

{% load ska_tags %}

{% for item in items%}

    {% provider_sign_url url=item.get_absolute_url provider='client_1.users' as item_signed_absolute_url %}
    <a href="{{ item_signed_absolute_url }}">{{ item }}</a>

{% endfor %}

Authentication backends

Allows you to get a password-less login to Django web site.

At the moment there are two backends implemented:

By default, number of logins using the same token is not limited. If you wish that single tokens become invalid after first use, set the following variables to True in your projects' Django settings module.

SKA_DB_STORE_SIGNATURES = True
SKA_DB_PERFORM_SIGNATURE_CHECK = True
SkaAuthenticationBackend

SkaAuthenticationBackend uses standard Django settings.

Recipient side

Recipient is the host (Django site), to which the sender tries to get authenticated (log in). On the recipient side the following shall be present.

settings.py 
AUTHENTICATION_BACKENDS = (
    'ska.contrib.django.ska.backends.SkaAuthenticationBackend',
    'django.contrib.auth.backends.ModelBackend',
)

INSTALLED_APPS = (
    # ...
    'ska.contrib.django.ska',
    # ...
)

SKA_SECRET_KEY = 'secret-key'
SKA_UNAUTHORISED_REQUEST_ERROR_TEMPLATE = 'ska/401.html'
SKA_REDIRECT_AFTER_LOGIN = '/foo/logged-in/'
urls.py 
urlpatterns = [
    url(r'^ska/', include('ska.contrib.django.ska.urls')),
    url(r'^admin/', include(admin.site.urls)),
]
Callbacks

There are several callbacks implemented for authentication backend.

  • USER_VALIDATE_CALLBACK (str): Validate request callback. Created to allow adding custom logic to the incoming authentication requests. The main purpose is to provide a flexible way of raising exceptions if the incoming authentication request shall be blocked (for instance, email or username is in black-list or right the opposite - not in the white list). The only aim of the USER_VALIDATE_CALLBACK is to raise a django.core.PermissionDenied exception if request data is invalid. In that case authentication flow will halt. All other exceptions would simply be ignored (but logged) and if no exception raised, the normal flow would be continued.
  • USER_GET_CALLBACK (str): Fired if user was successfully fetched from database (existing user).
  • USER_CREATE_CALLBACK (str): Fired right after user has been created (user didn't exist).
  • USER_INFO_CALLBACK (str): Fired upon successful authentication.

Example of a callback function (let's say, it resides in module my_app.ska_callbacks):

def my_callback(user, request, signed_request_data)
    # Your code

...where:

  • user is django.contrib.auth.models.User instance.
  • request is django.http.HttpRequest instance.
  • signed_request_data is dictionary with signed request data.

For example, if you need to assign user to some local Django group, you could specify the group name on the client side (add it to the extra dictionary) and based on that, add the user to the group in the callback.

The callback is a path qualifier of the callback function. Considering the example above, it would be my_app.ska_callbacks.my_callback.

Prefix names of each callback variable with SKA_ in your projects' settings module.

Example:

SKA_USER_GET_CALLBACK = 'my_app.ska_callbacks.my_get_callback'
SKA_USER_CREATE_CALLBACK = 'my_app.ska_callbacks.my_create_callback'
Sender side

Sender is the host (another Django web site) from which users authenticate to the Recipient using signed URLs.

On the sender side, the only thing necessary to be present is the ska module for Django and of course the same SECRET_KEY as on the server side. Further, the server ska login URL (in our case "/ska/login/") shall be signed using ska (for example, using sign_url function). The auth_user param would be used as a Django username. See the example below.

from ska import sign_url
from ska.contrib.django.ska.settings import SECRET_KEY

server_ska_login_url = 'https://server-url.com/ska/login/'

signed_url = sign_url(
    auth_user='test_ska_user_0',
    secret_key=SECRET_KEY,
    url=server_ska_login_url,
    extra={
        'email': 'john.doe@mail.example.com',
        'first_name': 'John',
        'last_name': 'Doe',
    }
)

Note, that you extra dictionary is optional! If email, first_name and last_name keys are present, upon successful validation, the data would be saved into users' profile.

Put this code, for instance, in your view and then make the generated URL available in template context and render it as a URL so that user can click on it for authenticating to the server.

def auth_to_server(request, template_name='auth_to_server.html'):
    # Some code + obtaining the `signed_url` (code shown above)
    context = {'signed_url': signed_url}

    return render(request, template_name, context)
SkaAuthenticationConstanceBackend

Relies on dynamic settings functionality provided by django-constance.

Only differences with `SkaAuthenticationBackend` are mentioned.

Note

Additional requirements shall be installed. See the constance.txt file for additional requirements (django-constance, django-json-widget, django-picklefield, jsonfield2 and redis).

settings.py
AUTHENTICATION_BACKENDS = (
    'ska.contrib.django.ska.backends.constance_backend.SkaAuthenticationConstanceBackend',
    'django.contrib.auth.backends.ModelBackend',
)

INSTALLED_APPS = (
    # ...
    'constance',  # django-constance
    'ska.contrib.django.ska',
    'django_json_widget',  # For nice admin JSON widget
    # ...
)

CONSTANCE_CONFIG = {
    'SKA_PROVIDERS': (
        {},  # The default value
        'JSON data',  # Help text in admin
        'JSONField_config',  # Field config
    )
}

CONSTANCE_ADDITIONAL_FIELDS = {
    'JSONField_config': [
        # `jsonfield2` package might be used for storing the JSON field,
        # however, at the moment of writing it has a bug which makes
        # the JSON invalid after the first save. To avoid that, it has
        # been patched and resides in examples/simple/jsonfield2_addons/
        # module.
        'jsonfield2_addons.forms.JSONField',
        {
            'widget': 'django_json_widget.widgets.JSONEditorWidget',
        }
    ],
}

CONSTANCE_BACKEND = 'constance.backends.redisd.RedisBackend'

CONSTANCE_REDIS_CONNECTION = {
    'host': 'localhost',
    'port': 6379,
    'db': 0,
}

Note

In very tiny bits, although not required, the jsonfield2 and django-json-widget packages are used for editing of the SKA_PROVIDERS setting in Django admin.

Note

In the example shown above, the RedisBackend of django-constance is used. You could also use DatabaseBackend. Study the documentation for more.

Note

If your SKA_PROVIDERS settings are stored in the constance as str instead of dict, set the setting SKA_CONSTANCE_SETTINGS_PARSE_FROM_JSON to True.

With DatabaseBackend it would look as follows:

CONSTANCE_BACKEND = 'constance.backends.database.DatabaseBackend'

INSTALLED_APPS = (
    # ...
    'constance.backends.database',
    # ...
)

Quick demo of the dynamic backend

  • Clone this project:
git clone git@github.com:barseghyanartur/ska.git
  • Install/migrate:
./scripts/install.sh
pip install -r examples/requirements/django_2_1.txt
./scripts/migrate.sh --settings=settings.constance_settings
  • Run:
./scripts/runserver.sh --settings=settings.constance_settings
{
   "client_1.users":{
      "SECRET_KEY":"client-1-users-secret-key"
   },
   "client_1.power_users":{
      "SECRET_KEY":"client-1-power-users-secret-key",
      "USER_CREATE_CALLBACK":"foo.ska_callbacks.client1_power_users_create"
   },
   "client_1.admins":{
      "SECRET_KEY":"client-1-admins-secret-key",
      "USER_CREATE_CALLBACK":"foo.ska_callbacks.client1_admins_create",
      "USER_GET_CALLBACK":"foo.ska_callbacks.client1_admins_get",
      "USER_INFO_CALLBACK":"foo.ska_callbacks.client1_admins_info_constance",
      "REDIRECT_AFTER_LOGIN":"/admin/auth/user/"
   }
}
  • Open http://localhost:8000/foo/authenticate/ in another browser and navigate to the Log in - client_1.admins link in the Success table column of the By provider section. Upon clicking, you should be logged in. You have used the dynamic settings.
urls.py

django-constance specific views and urls are used. See ska.contrib.django.ska.views.constance_views and ska.contrib.django.ska.urls.constance_urls for the reference.

urlpatterns = [
    url(r'^ska/', include('ska.contrib.django.ska.urls.constance_urls')),
    url(r'^admin/', include(admin.site.urls)),
]
Custom authentication backend

To implement alternative authentication backend, see the following example:

from constance import config

from ska.contrib.django.backends import BaseSkaAuthenticationBackend

class SkaAuthenticationConstanceBackend(BaseSkaAuthenticationBackend):
    """Authentication backend."""

    def get_settings(self):
        """

        :return:
        """
        return config.SKA_PROVIDERS

That's it. The only thing the get_settings method shall return is dict with providers data (see the Multiple secret keys for the reference; return value of the get_settings` is ``SKA_PROVIDERS dict).

Purging of old signature data

If you have lots of visitors and the SKA_DB_STORE_SIGNATURES set to True, your database grows. If you wish to get rid of old signature token data, you may want to execute the following command using a cron job.

./manage.py ska_purge_stored_signature_data
Security notes

From point of security, you should be serving the following pages via HTTP secure connection:

  • The server login page (/ska/login/).
  • The client page containing the authentication links.

Django REST Framework integration

Permission classes

For protecting views without actually being authenticated into the system, specific permission classes are implemented (for both plan settings and provider settings, as well as both plain- and provider-settings work in combination with django-constance package).

The following permission classes are implemented:

  • SignedRequestRequired
  • ProviderSignedRequestRequired
  • ConstanceSignedRequestRequired
  • ConstanceProviderSignedRequestRequired

ProviderSignedRequestRequired example

from rest_framework.viewsets import ModelViewSet

from ska.contrib.django.ska.integration.drf.permissions import (
    ProviderSignedRequestRequired
)

from .models import FooItem
from .serializers import FooItemSerializer

class FooItemViewSet(ModelViewSet):
    """FooItem model viewset."""

    permission_classes = (ProviderSignedRequestRequired,)
    queryset = FooItem.objects.all()
    serializer_class = FooItemSerializer

Signing requests

Requests are signed the same way. Sample code:

# Given that we have `auth_user`, `auth_user_email`, `provider_name`
# (and the rest), the code would look as follows:

from ska import sign_url
from ska.defaults import DEFAULT_PROVIDER_PARAM

extra = {
    'email': auth_user_email,
    'first_name': first_name,
    'last_name': last_name,
}

if provider_name:
    extra.update({DEFAULT_PROVIDER_PARAM: provider_name})

signed_url = sign_url(
    auth_user=auth_user,
    secret_key=secret_key,
    url=url,
    extra=extra
)
JWT tokens for authentication

For obtaining JWT tokens for authentication. Also works with django-constance.

settings example

REST_FRAMEWORK = {
    'DEFAULT_AUTHENTICATION_CLASSES': (
        'rest_framework_jwt.authentication.JSONWebTokenAuthentication',
        'rest_framework.authentication.SessionAuthentication',
        'rest_framework.authentication.BasicAuthentication',
    ),
}

urls example

urlpatterns = [
    # ...
    url(
        r'^ska-rest/',
        include('ska.contrib.django.ska.integration.drf.urls.jwt_token')
    ),
]

Sample request

http://localhost:8008/ska-rest/obtain-jwt-token/
    ?signature=P92KWDDe0U84Alvu0tvmYoi8e8s%3D
    &auth_user=test_ska_user
    &valid_until=1548195246.0
    &extra=email%2Cfirst_name%2Clast_name
    &email=test_ska_user%40mail.example.com
    &first_name=John
    &last_name=Doe

Sample response

HTTP 200 OK
Allow: GET, HEAD, OPTIONS
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept

{
    "token": "eyJ0eXAiO.eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjo.m_saOvyKBO3"
}

Testing

Simply type:

pytest

Or use tox:

tox

Or use tox to check specific env:

tox -e py39

Or run Django tests:

python examples/simple/manage.py test ska --settings=settings.testing

Writing documentation

Keep the following hierarchy.

=====
title
=====

header
======

sub-header
----------

sub-sub-header
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

sub-sub-sub-header
++++++++++++++++++

sub-sub-sub-sub-header
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

sub-sub-sub-sub-sub-header
**************************

License

GPL-2.0-only OR LGPL-2.1-or-later

Support

For security issues contact me at the e-mail given in the Author section.

For overall issues, go to GitHub.

Author

Artur Barseghyan <artur.barseghyan@gmail.com>