RBAC

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Role Based Access Control (RBAC) is a model for giving a user access to one or more resources.
NIST CSRC RBAC is the de facto implementation [1].

Introduction

RBAC is an access control mechanism which:

  • Describes complex access control policies,
  • Reduces errors in administration,
  • Reduces cost of administration.
RBAC
Entity Relationship
The NIST RBAC Model uses a limited set of concepts to define an RBAC system as depicted below.
The system has (1) users, users have (2) sessions and sessions and users have (3) roles assigned to them.
Each role consist of (4) permissions and permissions are based on (5) objects and (6) operations.
Optional you can use the modal without Sessions. Instead of sessions the user may have an access-token that expires after a certain time period.
The model contains 6 main entities:
  1. user: this contains all the user data
  2. session: this contains the session data for all currently logged on users
  3. role: this contains all the roles that are defined
  4. permissions: this contains all the permissions based on objects and operations
  5. object: objects are the items that require protection
  6. operation: operations are the actions that are performed on the objects
  1. Model and Entity Relation taken from Mind-it [2].
  2. Model Database: https://www.mind-it.info/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/mysql_5.txt
  3. Model PHP: https://www.mind-it.info/2009/10/02/a-query-engine-for-php

Examples

As always an example makes more clear than anything else.

Generic example

Suppose we take a generic app as an example. The following fictive user and roles are defined:

User Role
Harm Admin
Riet Writer
Jan Reader
Guest Guest
Role Permission Object
Admin CRUD tabHome
CRUD tabInput
CRUD tabAdmin
Writer RU tabHome
RU tabInput
  tabAdmin
Reader R tabHome
R tabInput
  tabAdmin
Guest R tabHome
R tabInput
  tabAdmin

Specific example

The above generic example has a few disadvantages.

  1. The application may have different roles for different occurrences in an application.
  2. The object may have different roles for specific objects inside an application.

In case of the application Energy the user may have different houses and have different roles on those houses. I call that a filter.

User Role Filter
Harm Admin NOH-116
Admin AadR-2
Admin OST-16
Riet Writer NOH-116
Reader AadR-2
  OST-16
Jan   NOH-116
  AadR-2
Writer OST-16

And the second in the permissions and objects:

Role Permission Filter Object
Admin CRUD * tabHome
CRUD * tabAdmin
Writer RU Energy tabInput
R Energy tabAdmin
Reader R * tabInput
  * tabAdmin

As can be seen easily the filter has an improvement on the user-role-filter, but does makes the permission objects a mess.
Therefor:

  1. An extra table has to be created for the filter in the User-Role-Filter.
  2. The Permissions and objects needs to be made in a specific application-class.

The class example

Create the php classes:

  • RBAC_Object
  • RBAC_ORP
  • RBAC_Operation
/**
 * Class <code>RBAC_ORP</code> couples the Object and Role and Permission.
 *
 * Version:
 * - 0.1.0.1 - 08 Aug 2018 - Introduction.
 */
class RBAC_ORP {
   /** @var array The RBAC Objects.          */
   private $aObjects;

   /** @var array Multiple Dimension array.  */
   private $aORP;

function init() {
   $this->aObjects = array(
    10 => new RBAC_Object("tabHome"        , RBAC_Object::OBJ_PAGE),
    20 => new RBAC_Object("tabPrefs"       , RBAC_Object::OBJ_PAGE),
    21 => new RBAC_Object("tabPrefsGen"    , RBAC_Object::OBJ_PAGE),
    ...
    44 => new RBAC_Object("tabHelpAbout"   , RBAC_Object::OBJ_PAGE),
    /*
    90 => new RBAC_Object("tabTest"        , RBAC_Object::OBJ_FORM),
     */
   );

      // Creates the Object-Role-Permission.
      $this->aORP = array(
         10 => array( 'admin'  => RBAC_Operation::OPER_CRUD,
                      'writer' => RBAC_Operation::OPER_RU,
                      'reader' => RBAC_Operation::OPER_READ,
                      'guest'  => RBAC_Operation::OPER_READ,
                      '*'      => RBAC_Operation::OPER_READ),
         20 => array( 'admin'  => RBAC_Operation::OPER_CRUD,
                      'writer' => RBAC_Operation::OPER_RU,
                      'reader' => RBAC_Operation::OPER_RU,
                      'guest'  => RBAC_Operation::OPER_READ,
                      '*'      => RBAC_Operation::OPER_NORIGHT),
         21 => array( 'admin'  => RBAC_Operation::OPER_CRUD,
                      'writer' => RBAC_Operation::OPER_RU,
                      'reader' => RBAC_Operation::OPER_RU,
                      'guest'  => RBAC_Operation::OPER_READ,
                      '*'      => RBAC_Operation::OPER_NORIGHT),
          ...
         /*
         90 => array( 'admin'  => RBAC_Operation::OPER_CRUD),
         */
      );
  }  // init
}
class RBAC_Operation {
   /**
    * Operation access parameters.
    * @type integer/byte
    */
   const OPER_NORIGHT   =  0;
   const OPER_CREATE    =  1;
   const OPER_READ      =  2;
   const OPER_WRITE     =  4;
   const OPER_DELETE    =  8;
   const OPER_LOCKED    = 16;

   const OPER_CRUD      = 15; // Create(1) + Read(2) + Write(4) + Delete(8)
   const OPER_RU        =  6; //             Read(2) + Write(4)

 }

class RBAC_Object {

   const OBJ_PAGE = "objectPageTab";
   const OBJ_FORM = "objectForm";

   /** @var boolean Debug flag. */
   protected $debug = false;

   /** @var string Name of the object/operation. */
   private $objectName;

   /** @var enum type of the object. */
   private $objectType;

   /** @var boolean Locked (not uesed yet). */
   public $locked;

   public function __construct( $name, $type = RBAC_Object::OBJ_PAGE, $debug = false) {
      $this->debug      = $debug;
      $this->objectName = $name;
      $this->objectType = $type;
   }  // __construct

   ...
} 


See also

top

  • NIST CSC RBAC, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Computer Security Resource Center (CSRC) Role Base Access Control (RBAC) Presentation.
  • MyOwn RBAC Implementation, Sorry not public!

Reference

top

  1. NIST - CSRC National Institute of Standards and Technology - Computer Security Resource Center - Role Based Access Control.
  2. Mind-it, NIST RBAC Data Model