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# Tag: Security

## Baffling 5.7 global/status variables issues, unclean migration path

MySQL Configuration INFORMATION_SCHEMA Monitoring New Features Opinions orchestrator performance_schema Security Stored routines August 7, 2015August 19, 2015

MySQL 5.7 introduces a change in the way we query for global variables and status variables: the INFORMATION_SCHEMA.(GLOBAL|SESSION)_(VARIABLES|STATUS) tables are now deprecated and empty. Instead, we are to use the respective performance_schema.(global|session)_(variables|status) tables.

But the change goes farther than that; there is also a security change. Oracle created a pitfall of 2 changes at the same time:

1. Variables/status moved to a different table
2. Privileges required on said table

As an example, my non-root user gets:

>     mysql> show session variables like 'tx_isolation';
>     ERROR 1142 (42000): SELECT command denied to user 'normal_user'@'my_host' for table 'session_variables'

Who gets affected by this? Nearly everyone and everything.

- Your Nagios will not be able to read status variables
- Your ORM will not be able to determine session variables
- Your replication user will fail connecting (see this post by Giuseppe)
- And most everyone else.

The problem with the above is that involves two unrelated changes to your setup, which are not entirely simple to coordinate:

1. Change your app code to choose the correct schema (information_schema vs. performance_schema)
2. GRANT the permissions on your database

Perhaps at this point you still do not consider this to be a problem. You may be thinking: well, let’s first prepare by creating the GRANTs, and once that is in place, we can, at our leisure, modify the code.

Not so fast. Can you really that simply create those GRANTs? Continue reading » “Baffling 5.7 global/status variables issues, unclean migration path”

## Get per-object grants via common_schema

MySQL common_schema Security September 29, 2014

Did you know common_schema supports a complete breakdown of all accounts on your database server? It can provide you with the GRANT statements required to set up an account, the REVOKE statements to undo the former, and this can be broken down on a per-object & per-object-type basis. Consider the sql_grants view:

Find who has privileges on a table called t:

>     select * from common_schema.sql_grants where priv_level_name='table' and object_name='t'\G

>                GRANTEE: 'power1'@'localhost'
>                   user: power1
>                   host: localhost
>             priv_level: `mytst`.`t`
>        priv_level_name: table
>          object_schema: mytst
>            object_name: t
>     current_privileges: SELECT
>           IS_GRANTABLE: NO
>              sql_grant: GRANT SELECT ON `mytst`.`t` TO 'power1'@'localhost'
>             sql_revoke: REVOKE SELECT ON `mytst`.`t` FROM 'power1'@'localhost'
>          sql_drop_user: DROP USER 'power1'@'localhost'

or, who has privileges on the test schema:

>     select * from common_schema.sql_grants where priv_level_name='schema' and object_name='test' \G

>                GRANTEE: 'power1'@'localhost'
>                   user: power1
>                   host: localhost
>             priv_level: `test`.*
>        priv_level_name: schema
>          object_schema: NULL
>            object_name: test
>     current_privileges: ALTER, ALTER ROUTINE, CREATE, CREATE ROUTINE, CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES, CREATE VIEW, DELETE, DROP, EVENT, EXECUTE, INDEX, INSERT, LOCK TABLES, REFERENCES, SELECT, SHOW VIEW, TRIGGER, UPDATE
>           IS_GRANTABLE: NO
>              sql_grant: GRANT ALTER, ALTER ROUTINE, CREATE, CREATE ROUTINE, CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES, CREATE VIEW, DELETE, DROP, EVENT, EXECUTE, INDEX, INSERT, LOCK TABLES, REFERENCES, SELECT, SHOW VIEW, TRIGGER, UPDATE ON `test`.* TO 'power1'@'localhost'
>             sql_revoke: REVOKE ALTER, ALTER ROUTINE, CREATE, CREATE ROUTINE, CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES, CREATE VIEW, DELETE, DROP, EVENT, EXECUTE, INDEX, INSERT, LOCK TABLES, REFERENCES, SELECT, SHOW VIEW, TRIGGER, UPDATE ON `test`.* FROM 'power1'@'localhost'
>          sql_drop_user: DROP USER 'power1'@'localhost'

>                GRANTEE: 'test'@'localhost'
>                   user: test
>                   host: localhost
>             priv_level: `test`.*
>        priv_level_name: schema
>          object_schema: NULL
>            object_name: test
>     current_privileges: ALTER, ALTER ROUTINE, CREATE, CREATE ROUTINE, CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES, CREATE VIEW, DELETE, DROP, EVENT, EXECUTE, INDEX, INSERT, LOCK TABLES, REFERENCES, SELECT, SHOW VIEW, TRIGGER, UPDATE
>           IS_GRANTABLE: NO
>              sql_grant: GRANT ALTER, ALTER ROUTINE, CREATE, CREATE ROUTINE, CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES, CREATE VIEW, DELETE, DROP, EVENT, EXECUTE, INDEX, INSERT, LOCK TABLES, REFERENCES, SELECT, SHOW VIEW, TRIGGER, UPDATE ON `test`.* TO 'test'@'localhost'
>             sql_revoke: REVOKE ALTER, ALTER ROUTINE, CREATE, CREATE ROUTINE, CREATE TEMPORARY TABLES, CREATE VIEW, DELETE, DROP, EVENT, EXECUTE, INDEX, INSERT, LOCK TABLES, REFERENCES, SELECT, SHOW VIEW, TRIGGER, UPDATE ON `test`.* FROM 'test'@'localhost'
>          sql_drop_user: DROP USER 'test'@'localhost'

In the same manner, you can easily SELECT for all grants that are defined per-table, per-schema, … priv_level_name: is any one of ‘user’, ‘schema’, ‘table’, ‘column’, ‘routine’.

The above is a view, which aggregates data from all relevant INFORMATION_SCHEMA tables, normalizing and de-normalizing as necessary.

You might also want to look at sql_show_grants which provides with a no-breakdown GRANT for all accounts. It’s like a SHOW ALL GRANTS which doesn’t exist, plus it’s SELECTable.

Also, thanks to eval(), the above make for executable code. Consider: Continue reading » “Get per-object grants via common_schema”

## Some MySQL security tips

MySQL Security July 28, 2014

This is a brief list of security tips for MySQL. It is by no means complete.

- Follow the sudo example. Don’t let all you DBAs and Ops have the password for the root account. Have each and every one of them have their own personal super-duper account, with their own personal and private password. This makes it so easy when someone leaves the company. No need to change passwords, just to remove the employee’s account.
- Block root. Either remove it completely or forbid it from logging in. Yes, there’s a way hack in MySQL to have a valid account blocked from logging in. One way of making this happen is via common_schema‘s sql_accounts. Here’s how to block root account using common_schema:

>     mysql> CALL common_schema.eval("SELECT sql_block_account FROM sql_accounts WHERE USER = 'root'");

- Make lots of small users. Give nagios its own user. Give collectd its own user. Give orchestrator its own user. Give innotop its own user. Give whatever its own user. Yes, it’s more users to create, but you get to have each user as limited in privileges as possible, and you don’t get to wonder why your heartbeat script has SUPER, LOCK and SHUTDOWN privileges.
- Verify: set @@old_passwords=0; before setting a new password. Make sure your configuration does not specify old_passwords = 1. There is no reason to use “old passwords“. In fact, a 5.6 client will refuse connecting with an “old password”.
- Give no access to mysql.*. No one should be tampering directly with the mysql system tables.
- Run oak-security-audit or, if you have common_schema installed (you mean you don’t?), just CALL security_audit(); I can (almost) guarantee you’d be surprised and thankful for the security breakdown. Users without passwords, users sharing same passwords, users with unreasonable privileges, and more… You’ll see them all.
- If you have web interfaces to your database or some of its aspects (e.g. Anemometer, Propagator, Orchestrator, monitoring, …), protect it via LDAP group or similar. Not everyone who has access to your network needs to see you database. Neither does every employee.

## Introducing audit_login: simple MySQL login logfile based auditing

MySQL Development Open Source plugin Security September 17, 2013

audit_login is a simple MySQL login auditing plugin, logging any login or login attempt to log file in JSON format.

It seems that audit plugins are all the rage lately… We’ve developed out simple plugin a month ago as part of our database securing efforts; by auditing any login or login attempt we could either intercept or later investigate suspicious logins.

However we quickly realized there is much more to be gathered by this info.

In very short, you install this plugin onto your MySQL server, and your server starts writing into a text file called audit_login.log entries such as follows:

>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 09:11:47","type":"successful_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153868","user":"web_user","priv_user":"web_user","host":"web-87.localdomain","ip":"10.0.0.87"}
>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 09:11:55","type":"failed_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153869","user":"backup_user","priv_user":"","host":"web-32","ip":"10.0.0.32"}
>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 09:11:57","type":"failed_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153870","user":"backup_user","priv_user":"","host":"web-32","ip":"10.0.0.32"}
>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 09:12:48","type":"successful_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153871","user":"root","priv_user":"root","host":"localhost","ip":"10.0.0.111"}
>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 09:13:26","type":"successful_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153872","user":"web_user","priv_user":"web_user","host":"web-11.localdomain","ip":"10.0.0.11"}
>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 09:13:44","type":"successful_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153873","user":"web_user","priv_user":"web_user","host":"web-40.localdomain","ip":"10.0.0.40"}
>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 09:13:51","type":"successful_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153874","user":"web_user","priv_user":"web_user","host":"web-03.localdomain","ip":"10.0.0.03"}
>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 09:14:09","type":"successful_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153875","user":"web_user","priv_user":"web_user","host":"web-40.localdomain","ip":"10.0.0.40"}
>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 10:55:25","type":"successful_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153876","user":"web_user","priv_user":"web_user","host":"web-87.localdomain","ip":"10.0.0.87"}
>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 10:55:59","type":"successful_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153877","user":"web_user","priv_user":"web_user","host":"web-12.localdomain","ip":"10.0.0.12"}
>     {"ts":"2013-09-11 10:55:59","type":"failed_login","myhost":"gromit03","thread":"74153878","user":"(null)","priv_user":"(null)","host":"(null)","ip":"10.0.0.1"}

In the above your MySQL server is on gromit03, and is accepting connections from other hosts; some successful, some not. What kind of information can you gather from the above?

- You can tell how many connections are being created on your server
- Where they came from
- Where ‘root’ connections come from
- Port scans (see last row) can be identified by no credentials. These don’t have to be port scans per se; any telnet localhost 3006 followed by Ctrl+D will show the same. Typically these would be either load balancer or monitoring tools checks to see that the 3306 port is active.
- You can tell which accounts connect, and how many times
- And you can infer which accounts are stale and can be dropped — if an account does not connect within a week’s time, it’s probably stale (pick your own timeframe)

The above is quite interesting on one host; but we have dozens. We’ve installed this plugin on all our MySQL servers, and we use logstash to aggregate them. We aggregate to two destinations: Continue reading » “Introducing audit_login: simple MySQL login logfile based auditing”

## MySQL security top wish list

MySQL Security August 29, 2013August 29, 2013

Security seems to have no boundaries. I’ve been tightening our database security lately, and it seems like this could go on forever: from app to console to privileges to server, there are so many aspects to managing database security. Unfortunately, this is a field where MySQL is in particular weak, and with very little work done in the many years I’ve been working with MySQL.

My very own top-wanted security features for MySQL follows. Surely this is but a small subset, your mileage may vary.

#### Autherntication-only SSL

By default, MySQL client API is unencrypted and passwords are sent in cleartext. MySQL supports SSL, but it an “all or nothing” deal: if you want to use SSL, then everything goes by SSL: any query, SELECT, DDL and whatnot.

[UPDATE]: Thanks to Davi & Jan for correcting me on this: passwords are not sent via cleartext. I’m not sure by which constellation I saw cleartext passwords being sent — but obviously that was long time ago. Just verified via tcpdump, got “mysql_native_password” message and no cleartext password. Lesson learned!

#### Roles

Need I elaborate? This is a fundamental construct in a database grant system. The effort of maintaining multiple accounts with similar/identical privileges is overwhelming. (PS I haven’t used Securich to date)

#### Host aggregation

In MySQL the combination of user+host makes for a distinct account. Thus, ‘gromit’@’192.168.%’ is a completely different account than ‘gromit’@’10.10.%’. I get the idea: you can have more privileges to, say, gromit@localhost than for gromit@’192.%’. In practice, this only makes a headache. In all my years, I have never encountered nor designed a privilege set where two accounts of the same user had different set of privileges. Never ever ever. It is confusing and pointless: if an account has a different set of roles, just call it by another name! Continue reading » “MySQL security top wish list”

## MySQL security tasks easily solved with common_schema

MySQL common_schema Security January 17, 2013January 17, 2013

Here are three security tasks I handled, which I’m happy to say were easily solved with common_schema‘s views and routines (with no prior planning). Two are so easy, that I actually now integrated them into common_schema 1.3:

- Duplicate a user (create new user with same privileges as another’s)
- Find users with identical set of grants (same roles)
- Finding redundant users (users who only have privileges on non-existing objects); I was approached on this by Sheeri K. Cabral from Mozilla.

#### Duplicate user

How would you duplicate a grantee? That’s easy! Just get the SHOW GRANTS output, then do text search and replace: replace the existing account (e.g. ‘existing’@’localhost’) with the new account (e.g. ‘newcomer’@’localhost’).

Ahem. And how would you get the output of SHOW GRANTS? That’s right: you can’t do this from within the server. You have to go outside the server, incoke mysql client, sed your way into it, then connect to MySQL again to invoke the GRANT query… Or you can do this by hand, of course, or you can use the new mysqluserclone tool from MySQL utilities. Bottom line: you have to go outside the server. You can’t directly do this with your favorite GUI tool unless it has this function integrated.

But to have a truly automated, scriptable, server-side user-duplication you don’t need to go far, since the sql_show_grants view simulates a SHOW GRANTS output, but using plain old SQL. It produces the GRANT statement as SQL output. Which means you can REPLACE() the grantee. It’s actually a one liner, but is such a common operation that I created the duplicate_grantee() function for convenience. Just: Continue reading » “MySQL security tasks easily solved with common_schema”

## common_schema: 1.3: security goodies, parameterized split(), json-to-xml, query checksum

MySQL common_schema Development New Features Open Source QueryScript scripts Security January 14, 2013January 14, 2013

common_schema 1.3 is released and is available for download. New and noteworthy in this version:

- Parameterized split(): take further control over huge transactions by breaking them down into smaller chunks, now manually tunable if needed
- duplicate_grantee(): copy+paste existing accounts along with their full set of privileges
- similar_grants: find which accounts share the exact same set of privileges (i.e. have the same role)
- json_to_xml(): translate any valid JSON object into its equivalent XML form
- extract_json_value(): use XPath notation to extract info from JSON data, just as you would from XML
- query_checksum(): given a query, calculate a checksum on the result set
- random_hash(): get a 40 hexadecimal digits random hash, using a reasonably large changing input

Let’s take a closer look at the above:

#### Parameterized split()

split takes your bulk query and automagically breaks it down into smaller pieces. So instead of one huge UPDATE or DELETE or INSERT..SELECT transaction, you get many smaller transactions, each with smaller impact on I/O, locks, CPU.

As of 1.3, split() gets more exposed: you can have some control on its execution, and you also get a lot of very interesting info during operation.

Here’s an example of split() control:

>     set @script := "
>       split({start:7015, step:2000} : UPDATE sakila.rental SET return_date = return_date + INTERVAL 1 DAY)
>         throttle 1;
>     ";
>     call common_schema.run(@script);

In the above we choose a split size of 2,000 rows at a time; but we also choose to only start with 7015, skipping all rows prior to that value. Just what is that value? It depends on the splitting key (and see next example for just that); but in this table we can safely assume this is the rental_id PRIMARY KEY of the table.

You don’t have to use these control parameters. But they can save you some time and effort. Continue reading » “common_schema: 1.3: security goodies, parameterized split(), json-to-xml, query checksum”

## common_schema 1.2: security, partition management, processes, QueryScript goodies

MySQL common_schema Open Source partitioning QueryScript Security November 13, 2012

common_schema 1.2 is released! This version comes shortly after 1.1, yet contains quite a few interesting goodies:

- Account blocking
- Security audit
- RANGE partition management
- Slave status
- Better blocking and idle transaction management
- QueryScript goodies:
  - echo, report
  - while-otherwise statement; foreach-otherwise statement
  - Better variable scope handling
  - Complete support for variable expansion
  - Transaction support within QueryScript
- More summary info and SQL statements in processlist-related views

A closer look at these follows:

#### Account blocking

A new view called sql_accounts, inspired by oak-block-account (also see here and here) provides with the means of blocking use accounts (and releasing them, of course) without revoking their privileges. It offers the SQL statements to block an account (by modifying its password in a symmetric way) and to release an account (by modifying its password back to normal). It really works like a charm. Together with killall() and sql_accounts this gives the administrator great control over accounts.

#### Security audit

Imported from openark kit, and implemented via QueryScript, the security_audit() procedure will audit your accounts, passwords and general settings to find problems, pitfalls and security hazards. I will write more on this later.

#### RANGE partition management

The sql_range_partitions view manages your RANGE and RANGE COLUMNS partitioned tables by providing with the SQL statements to drop oldest partitions and to create the next (in sequence) partitions. See my earlier post. Continue reading » “common_schema 1.2: security, partition management, processes, QueryScript goodies”

## common_schema rev. 68: eval(), processlist_grantees, candidate_keys, easter_day()

MySQL common_schema Indexing Open Source Security September 6, 2011

Revision 68 of common_schema is out, and includes some interesting features:

- eval(): Evaluates the queries generated by a given query
- match_grantee(): Match an existing account based on user+host
- processlist_grantees: Assigning of GRANTEEs for connected processes
- candidate_keys: Listing of prioritized candidate keys: keys which are UNIQUE, by order of best-use.
- easter_day(): Returns DATE of easter day in given DATETIME’s year.

Let’s take a slightly closer look at these:

#### eval()

I’ve dedicated this blog post on MySQL eval() to describe it. In simple summary: eval() takes a query which generates queries (most common use queries on INFORMATION_SCHEMA) and auto-evaluates (executes) those queries. Read more

#### match_grantee()

As presented in Finding CURRENT_USER for any user, I’ve developed the algorithm to match a connected user+host details (as presented with PROCESSLIST) with the grantee tables (i.e. the mysql.user table), in a manner which simulates the MySQL server account matching algorithm.

This is now available as a stored function: given a user+host, the function returns with the best matched grantee. Read more

#### processlist_grantees

This view relies on the above, and maps the entire PROCESSLIST onto GRANTEEs. The view maps each process onto the GRANTEE (MySQL account) which is the owner of that process. Surprisingly, MySQL does not provide one with such information. Continue reading » “common_schema rev. 68: eval(), processlist_grantees, candidate_keys, easter_day()”

## Finding CURRENT_USER for any user

MySQL common_schema Security SQL August 9, 2011

A MySQL account is a user/host combination. A MySQL connection is done by a user connecting from some host.

However, the user/host from which the connection is made are not the same as the user/host as specified in the account. For example, the account may be created thus:

>     CREATE USER 'temp'@'10.0.0.%' IDENTIFIED BY '123456';

The host as specified in the above account is a wildcard host. A connection by the ‘temp’ user from ‘10.0.0.3’ can map into that account. It thus happens that the connected user is ‘temp’@’10.0.0.3’, yet the assigned account is ‘temp’@’10.0.0.%’.

MySQL provides with the USER() and CURRENT_USER() which map to the connected user and the assigned account, respectively, and which lets the current session identify the relation between the two. Read more on this on the MySQL docs.

#### The problem

And the trouble is: MySQL only provides this functionality for the current session. Surprisingly, given a user/host combination, I cannot get MySQL to tell me which account matches those details.

#### The inconsistency

And I care because there is an inconsistency. Namely, when I do SHOW PROCESSLIST MySQL tells me the user & host from which the connection is made. It does not tell me the account for which the process is assigned. Continue reading » “Finding CURRENT_USER for any user”