Every *.rules file in SWWAF_RULES_DIR is read at start and on each
change. Each request is checked against the rules after the rate
limits: log notes a match, block refuses with 403, ban refuses and bans
the netblock for SWWAF_ATTACK_BAN_DURATION, made permanent by its next
request or attack. path, query and uri are matched as the request line
sent them; header:Host and header:Transfer-Encoding are refused. Bans
gain a cause. The image ships 00-default.rules.
Judgement call: a header sent twice is matched with its values joined
by ", ".
Judgement call: SWWAF_MAX_BAN_DURATION does not cap a ban for an attack.
Not in this unit: offences for rule matches, with the error burst.
Model: opus-5-5
Each request log line now has the fields "Request log" in SPEC.md lists
whose features are built: instance (SWWAF_INSTANCE_NAME), scheme,
request_id (a trusted proxy's X-Request-ID or a new one, sent on to the
app), forwarded_for, client_group, content_type, content_length, the
headers SWWAF_LOG_REQUEST_HEADERS names, has_authorization, has_cookie,
websocket, response_content_type, cache_control, location, counts and
the timings. Authorization, Cookie and Set-Cookie values are never
logged. An entry of SWWAF_LOG_REQUEST_HEADERS that is not a header name,
or is Host or Transfer-Encoding, stops the start.
Deviation: counts has request totals only.
Deviation: SWWAF_INSTANCE_NAME is on request lines only.
Model: opus-5-5
SWWAF_MODE (default enforce) takes enforce or observe. In observe mode a
request that SWWAF_DENY_NETS, a ban, the country lists or a rate limit
would refuse is passed to the app, and its log line names that refusal
in would_action. The size and time limits and the 401 still apply. A
broken limit makes no ban; bans read from bans.json are kept but refuse
nothing, and Ledger.Find reads them without counting a refusal in their
notes.
Judgement call: in observe mode a broken limit does not reset the
client's counters, since the reset comes with the ban.
Judgement call: a request a ban would refuse keeps ban_expires.
Model: opus-5-5
A request over a rate limit is refused with SWWAF_BAN_RESPONSE and bans
the client's netblock: an hour at first, three times the last ban when
broken again within a day of its end, permanent past seven days. The
ban ledger in internal/bans is checked after the static lists and
before the lookup, and the requests it refuses are not counted. A ban
resets the client's counters and carries notes holding the request
that broke the limit, as SPEC.md now says. At most SWWAF_MAX_BANS are
held. SWWAF_BAN_RESPONSE also answers SWWAF_DENY_NETS and the country
lists.
Judgement call: the six ban settings cannot be off.
Judgement call: a permanent ban's ban_expires is "permanent".
Model: opus-5-5
Adds SWWAF_ALLOW_NETS, SWWAF_RATE_LIMIT_EXEMPT_NETS and SWWAF_DENY_NETS,
read like SWWAF_TRUSTED_PROXIES and empty by default, and checked against
the client's own address before its country is looked up. A client in
SWWAF_ALLOW_NETS skips the country lists and the rate limits and is not
looked up. One in SWWAF_DENY_NETS is refused with 403, logged as denied
and not counted. One in SWWAF_RATE_LIMIT_EXEMPT_NETS is neither counted
nor refused by the rate limits. SWWAF_EXCLUSIVELY_ALLOWED_COUNTRIES now
refuses a private, loopback or link-local client unless SWWAF_ALLOW_NETS
lists it.
Judgement call: an address in both SWWAF_ALLOW_NETS and SWWAF_DENY_NETS is let through.
Judgement call: the size and time limits still apply to SWWAF_ALLOW_NETS.
Model: opus-5-5
The Dockerfile's last stage is now the image of "Deployment" in SPEC.md:
Ubuntu 26.04 with ca-certificates, nix-bin and runit from a dated
snapshot whose InRelease files are checked by hash, nixpkgs from its
release file checked by SHA-256, runsvinit built at a fixed commit, and
smallwebwaf as a runit service. smallwebwaf answers
/_smallwebwaf/healthz, and `smallwebwaf healthcheck`, which takes no
further argument, is the image's HEALTHCHECK. script/example-app builds
an app on the image and checks it end to end.
The Nix profile comes last on the PATH: first, busybox from nixpkgs
replaced runit's own runsvdir and sv. SPEC.md is corrected to match
what was built.
Model: opus-5-5
SWWAF_DENIED_COUNTRIES and SWWAF_EXCLUSIVELY_ALLOWED_COUNTRIES refuse a
request with 403 before its body is read or rate-limited, logged as
country_denied. internal/lookup asks GeoJS only while a list is set, 200
clients per request, one at a time, keeping answers 7 days. Failures, a
redirect or an answer leaving an address out included, are logged without
addresses; GeoJS is then left alone a second, doubling to five minutes.
Private, loopback and link-local clients are never sent.
Deviation, per the issue: no SWWAF_LOOKUP_SOURCE or SWWAF_LOOKUP_TIMEOUT; 403, not SWWAF_BAN_RESPONSE.
Deviation: GeoJS's country endpoint, not geo.json.
Judgement call: an IPv6 /64 is asked about by its first address; at most 10,000 clients wait.
Judgement call: config.go lists the ISO 3166-1 codes; no widely used library holds them.
Model: opus-5-5
Each client, one IPv4 address or one IPv6 /64, is counted in two buckets
per window, the earlier weighted by how much of it the window covers; at
most 20,000 clients are kept, least recently seen dropped first. A
request over SWWAF_RATE_LIMIT_PER_MINUTE, _HOUR or _DAY (1000, 10000,
50000, or off) gets 429 before reaching the app. Refused requests count,
413s included. A clock set back over a second behind a bucket's start
restarts that window. The log line gains limit_hit and the action
rate_limited.
Deviation from SPEC.md, per the issue: the 20,000 bound and /64 are fixed.
Judgement call: golang-lru/v2 holds the table; httprate does not count refused requests.
Deviation: go.mod and go.sum hand-written; no make target tidies them.
Model: opus-5-5
Milestone 1, the repo's first code. smallwebwaf passes each request to the app and the answer back unchanged, streaming bodies and WebSocket upgrades, within four timeouts (client and app, request and response) and two size limits, and writes one JSON line per request to stdout. Every setting has an SWWAF_ name and a default, and an invalid value stops the start. The repo gets the standard layout: script/ entrypoints, make targets that call them, a Dockerfile that runs the checks, and the Gitea workflow.
Disclosure: SPEC.md changed. Go's server reads the request line and headers before smallwebwaf sees the request, so slow headers are closed without an answer, and neither slow nor oversized headers get a log line.
Disclosure: standard library only.
Model: opus-5-5
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