SWWAF_ANOMALY_CLIENT_*, _NET_*, _ASN_*, _TOTAL_* and SWWAF_WATCH_* with
SWWAF_WATCH_NETS: requests and bytes per minute and per hour, each off by
default; with all off, nothing is counted. Otherwise every request but the
health check is counted, allow-listed and exempt ones included; a count
over its threshold raises an anomaly alert, with a cooldown per scope. At
most 20,000 counters, kept in alerts.json. A per-AS-number threshold with
lookups off, or a malformed SWWAF_WATCH_NETS, stops the start. A cooldown
that has run out is dropped as the hour ends, whatever it held back; the
hour's summary gives its repeats.
Judgement call: refused requests are counted too.
Judgement call: per-client counters are kept in alerts.json, which SPEC.md does not list.
Judgement call: a request counts for an AS number only if the lookup answered before it ended.
Model: opus-5-5
SWWAF_ASN_LIMIT_PERCENT and SWWAF_COUNTRY_LIMIT_PERCENT give the clients
of the AS numbers and countries they list that percentage of every rate
and byte limit, rounded down; SWWAF_ASN_BYTES_PERCENT and
SWWAF_COUNTRY_BYTES_PERCENT take its place for the byte limits of those
they list; SWWAF_UNKNOWN_LIMIT_PERCENT (100) covers clients without a
country. The lowest applies. While one lowers a limit, a request waits
for its client's lookup, and SWWAF_LOOKUP_SOURCE=off stops the start. Log
lines give limit_percent and bytes_percent with their settings; ban
notes, and so alerts, give the broken limit's.
Judgement call: a client without a country is unknown, whatever its AS number.
Judgement call: bytes_percent and its setting are log fields SPEC does not name.
Rule suppressed: funlen on FromEnvironment, one line per setting.
Model: opus-5-5
SWWAF_BYTES_LIMIT_PER_MINUTE, _PER_HOUR and _PER_DAY (10G, 20G, 50G)
and SWWAF_BYTES_COUNT (both). A request's bytes are counted once its
answer has ended, for a request passed to the app that the rate limits
count; what a WebSocket carries each way, once it closes. Bytes over a
limit ban the client as a broken rate limit does, and cut nothing
short. clients.json keeps the byte buckets, the log line's counts carry
the byte totals, ban notes say what the limit is on, and the limit hits
metric is labelled by kind.
Judgement call: limit_hit names a byte window minute_bytes, hour_bytes
or day_bytes, as counts names the byte totals.
Judgement call: in observe mode, the bytes of a request enforce mode
would have refused are not counted.
Model: opus-5-5
GeoJS's geo.json is asked about every new visitor unless
SWWAF_LOOKUP_SOURCE is off. A request waits for its client's first
answer only while a country list or SWWAF_ADD_LOOKUP_HEADERS needs it;
otherwise the answer reaches the client's history and ban notes when it
comes. The AS number and name go beside the country in the request log,
history, ban notes, alerts and lookups.json, with metrics by AS number;
64512 counts as unknown. A client's own X-Client-ASN and
X-Client-Country never reach the app, whatever the setting says, and
make example-app sends no address to GeoJS.
Judgement call: AS numbers are written AS64496, as SPEC's settings write them.
Judgement call: SWWAF_LOOKUP_TIMEOUT is added, default 1s, and cannot be off.
Model: opus-5-5
Process log lines carry instance, as request lines do; the instance name
is read before the other settings, so the line saying a setting is
invalid carries it too. Every metric, Go's and the process's included,
carries the label instance, set once on the registry. README.md says so,
and that Prometheus keeps it as exported_instance unless the scrape sets
honor_labels. An instance name that is not valid UTF-8 stops the start,
as the metrics library panics on such a label.
Tests that read metrics expect the label; one helper replaces the alert
tests' loops that wait for them.
Judgement call: the label is named instance, as in the log lines and
alerts, although Prometheus gives each target a label of that name.
Model: opus-5-5
Each alert is posted as a message to the Slack incoming webhook
SWWAF_ALERT_SLACK_WEBHOOK_URL names, and published to the ntfy topic
SWWAF_ALERT_NTFY_URL names, with SWWAF_ALERT_NTFY_TOKEN as a bearer
token and a priority and tag by event. The cooldown and the hourly
limit stay shared; past them, each destination has its own bounded
queue and backoff, and its own sent, failed and dropped counts.
alerts.json keeps the alerts waiting by destination; one whose waiting
is still a list stops the start, saying what to change. A control
character in the ntfy token, or in the instance name ntfy is sent,
stops the start.
Judgement call: messages also give the detail's file, source, error and mode.
Judgement call: alerts_suppressed_total is the same for every destination.
Model: opus-5-5
SWWAF_ALERT_WEBHOOK_URL gets one JSON POST per alert, in SPEC.md's
schema, with SWWAF_ALERT_WEBHOOK_HEADERS: ban and permanent_ban, with
the ban's notes, in observe mode too, marked mode observe and worked
out only when the alert would be sent; source_failure for GeoJS;
file_error for a rule or state file with an error. SWWAF_ALERT_EVENTS
chooses; SWWAF_ALERT_COOLDOWN holds back repeats by netblock, file or
source; past SWWAF_ALERT_MAX_PER_HOUR the hour ends in one summary. A
bounded queue, retried with backoff, holds up no request; a 4xx other
than 408 and 429 gives the alert up. alerts.json keeps the queue, the
cooldowns and the hour. Nothing shows the URL's path or query.
Judgement call: the summary's event is summary, which SPEC.md omits.
Judgement call: an admin's ban raises no alert.
Model: opus-5-5
SWWAF_ADMIN_TOKEN, or its _FILE form, opens GET and POST
/_smallwebwaf/bans, DELETE /_smallwebwaf/bans/<client> and GET
/_smallwebwaf/clients/<ip>. Unset, they answer 404; a missing or wrong
token gets 401, in observe mode too. They go through every check, as
the metrics do. POST takes a netblock, not IPv4-mapped and without a
zone, or a client's address, a duration or permanent, and a reason, and
makes an admin ban even while another lasts. DELETE lifts every active
ban covering the address, kept and marked lifted. Bans come back as
bans.json entries; a client as clients.json holds it, with its bans.
Judgement call: answers leave out bans.json's version field.
Judgement call: DELETE takes an address, not a netblock.
Rule suppressed: gosec G304 on a test reading bans.json.
Model: opus-5-5
A bans.json entry without a cause gets the cause admin, written back so.
Bans whose cause is admin are never dropped and do not count toward
SWWAF_MAX_BANS, so setting a ban's cause to admin keeps it. Bans
smallwebwaf makes get a reason: the limit broken or the rule matched. A
lifted ban refuses nothing, is kept, and makes no later ban longer.
smallwebwaf_bans_made_total counts admin bans an edit adds while running;
earlier_bans counts admin in place of without_cause.
Judgement call: lifted lifts at once, whatever time it gives.
Judgement call: a lifted ban still counts in earlier_bans.
Known gap: a ban dropped from behind an admin's ban on its netblock leaves that netblock's later earlier_bans.
Model: opus-5-5
Every *.rules file in SWWAF_RULES_DIR not named with a leading dot is
read at start, and again 2 seconds after the directory's last 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
smallwebwaf watches SWWAF_STATE_DIR with fsnotify and takes in a saved
edit of a state file in place of what it held. It knows its own writes
by the SHA-256 of what it last read or wrote; each write first takes in
an edit made since. An edit that does not parse is renamed to
<name>.bad at the next write. Each edit taken in or set aside is logged
and counted. Every ban on a netblock is checked, and the next ban is
worked out from the one that ended last. README.md says how to add and
lift a ban.
Judgement call: a broken edit is set aside at the next write, since an
editor's file can be read half written.
Model: opus-5-5
GET /_smallwebwaf/metrics answers in the Prometheus text format for a
request carrying SWWAF_METRICS_TOKEN, 401 without it and 404 while it is
unset. Every request under /_smallwebwaf/ but the health check now goes
through the checks and is answered where it would be forwarded, 404 for
any path but the metrics, so none reaches the app. In the client's
history a 401 counts as refused, the metrics and the 404s as neither.
SWWAF_METRICS_TOP_N bounds the series by country, the rest counted as
other.
Deviation: go.mod and go.sum written by hand, as go runs only through
make.
Deviation: no metrics yet for state files read again after an edit or
edits set aside; that work is not merged.
Model: opus-5-5
smallwebwaf now copies its state to bans.json, clients.json and
lookups.json in SWWAF_STATE_DIR, as "Persistent state" in SPEC.md
describes, and reads them back at start, so a restart lifts no ban and
gives no client a fresh allowance. Each client gains a history, and a
ban's notes count the netblock's requests. bans.json is written
SWWAF_STATE_WRITE_DELAY after a ban, and every file every
SWWAF_STATE_COUNTER_INTERVAL and at the stop. A ban read back is masked
to its netblock and refuses every client in it. A file that does not
parse, an unknown version, an entry without a field it needs, or an
unwritable directory stops the start.
Deviation: no AS number or name, and no ban cause, reason or lifting yet.
Model: opus-5-5
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