[db-wg] call for application authorisation ideas

On Fri, 21 Aug 2015, denis wrote:

> Hi job
>
> On 21/08/2015 02:32, Job Snijders wrote:
>>  On Fri, Aug 21, 2015 at 01:58:46AM +0200, denis wrote:
>> >  When it was suggested to hide the password hash I thought that was a
>> >  mistake. We should have hidden the whole MNTNER object from public
>> >  view. Why does anyone outside of my organisation need to see anything
>> >  in my MNTNER object? Why should you know if I use a password or PGP or
>> >  whatever? This is my business not yours.
>>
>>  This seems to play into another thread, where someone had trouble
>>  retrieving the proper value of some "auth:" lines. It would be worth
>>  exploring how we can hide all "auth:" lines yet make them easily
>>  accessible to the owner.
>
> Bear in mind that I have spent years thinking about some of these issues from 
> many angles :) Sometimes a simple, quick fix is considered to be the 
> appropriate course of action. I guess that is why we hid the password hashes. 
> But in the end that proved to be not simple. Sometimes it is worth taking a 
> step back and looking at a wider picture.
>
> If you hide anything there has to be some method for the right people to see 
> what is hidden. Once you start trying to hide significant parts of an object 
> it may be easier to hide the whole object. And there can be additional 
> benefits in that. Notifications are part of the security system within the 
> database. Just as with the security tokens, there is no justifiable reason 
> why the public should have any knowledge of who gets notified within my 
> organisation when data is changed or some attempt is made.
>
> If the whole MNTNER object is hidden it can be shown to authenticated users 
> by an update with a pseudo attribute. Just as with a "dryrun:", if we have 
> another pseudo attribute "show:" then instead of doing an update the full, 
> current object is returned if the authorisation is valid. This will work with 
> any of the authorisation tokens in the object.

Somethin like that, yes.

I agree that i might not be necessary for the whole world to know the 
exact persons listed in a maintainer object, as long as it is not hidden 
for those authorized.

Cheers,
Daniel

_________________________________________________________________________________
Daniel Stolpe           Tel:  08 - 688 11 81                   stolpe at resilans.se
Resilans AB             Fax:  08 - 55 00 21 63            http://www.resilans.se/
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