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+<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /><title>41.5. Rules and Privileges</title><link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="stylesheet.css" /><link rev="made" href="pgsql-docs@lists.postgresql.org" /><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets Vsnapshot" /><link rel="prev" href="rules-update.html" title="41.4. Rules on INSERT, UPDATE, and DELETE" /><link rel="next" href="rules-status.html" title="41.6. Rules and Command Status" /></head><body id="docContent" class="container-fluid col-10"><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="5" align="center">41.5. Rules and Privileges</th></tr><tr><td width="10%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="rules-update.html" title="41.4. Rules on INSERT, UPDATE, and DELETE">Prev</a> </td><td width="10%" align="left"><a accesskey="u" href="rules.html" title="Chapter 41. The Rule System">Up</a></td><th width="60%" align="center">Chapter 41. The Rule System</th><td width="10%" align="right"><a accesskey="h" href="index.html" title="PostgreSQL 15.4 Documentation">Home</a></td><td width="10%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="rules-status.html" title="41.6. Rules and Command Status">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr /></div><div class="sect1" id="RULES-PRIVILEGES"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title" style="clear: both">41.5. Rules and Privileges</h2></div></div></div><a id="id-1.8.6.10.2" class="indexterm"></a><a id="id-1.8.6.10.3" class="indexterm"></a><p>
+ Due to rewriting of queries by the <span class="productname">PostgreSQL</span>
+ rule system, other tables/views than those used in the original
+ query get accessed. When update rules are used, this can include write access
+ to tables.
+</p><p>
+ Rewrite rules don't have a separate owner. The owner of
+ a relation (table or view) is automatically the owner of the
+ rewrite rules that are defined for it.
+ The <span class="productname">PostgreSQL</span> rule system changes the
+ behavior of the default access control system. With the exception of
+ <code class="literal">SELECT</code> rules associated with security invoker views
+ (see <a class="link" href="sql-createview.html" title="CREATE VIEW"><code class="command">CREATE VIEW</code></a>),
+ all relations that are used due to rules get checked against the
+ privileges of the rule owner, not the user invoking the rule.
+ This means that, except for security invoker views, users only need the
+ required privileges for the tables/views that are explicitly named in
+ their queries.
+</p><p>
+ For example: A user has a list of phone numbers where some of
+ them are private, the others are of interest for the assistant of the office.
+ The user can construct the following:
+
+</p><pre class="programlisting">
+CREATE TABLE phone_data (person text, phone text, private boolean);
+CREATE VIEW phone_number AS
+ SELECT person, CASE WHEN NOT private THEN phone END AS phone
+ FROM phone_data;
+GRANT SELECT ON phone_number TO assistant;
+</pre><p>
+
+ Nobody except that user (and the database superusers) can access the
+ <code class="literal">phone_data</code> table. But because of the <code class="command">GRANT</code>,
+ the assistant can run a <code class="command">SELECT</code> on the
+ <code class="literal">phone_number</code> view. The rule system will rewrite the
+ <code class="command">SELECT</code> from <code class="literal">phone_number</code> into a
+ <code class="command">SELECT</code> from <code class="literal">phone_data</code>.
+ Since the user is the owner of
+ <code class="literal">phone_number</code> and therefore the owner of the rule, the
+ read access to <code class="literal">phone_data</code> is now checked against the user's
+ privileges and the query is permitted. The check for accessing
+ <code class="literal">phone_number</code> is also performed, but this is done
+ against the invoking user, so nobody but the user and the
+ assistant can use it.
+</p><p>
+ The privileges are checked rule by rule. So the assistant is for now the
+ only one who can see the public phone numbers. But the assistant can set up
+ another view and grant access to that to the public. Then, anyone
+ can see the <code class="literal">phone_number</code> data through the assistant's view.
+ What the assistant cannot do is to create a view that directly
+ accesses <code class="literal">phone_data</code>. (Actually the assistant can, but it will not work since
+ every access will be denied during the permission checks.)
+ And as soon as the user notices that the assistant opened
+ their <code class="literal">phone_number</code> view, the user can revoke the assistant's access. Immediately, any
+ access to the assistant's view would fail.
+</p><p>
+ One might think that this rule-by-rule checking is a security
+ hole, but in fact it isn't. But if it did not work this way, the assistant
+ could set up a table with the same columns as <code class="literal">phone_number</code> and
+ copy the data to there once per day. Then it's the assistant's own data and
+ the assistant can grant access to everyone they want. A
+ <code class="command">GRANT</code> command means, <span class="quote">“<span class="quote">I trust you</span>”</span>.
+ If someone you trust does the thing above, it's time to
+ think it over and then use <code class="command">REVOKE</code>.
+</p><p>
+ Note that while views can be used to hide the contents of certain
+ columns using the technique shown above, they cannot be used to reliably
+ conceal the data in unseen rows unless the
+ <code class="literal">security_barrier</code> flag has been set. For example,
+ the following view is insecure:
+</p><pre class="programlisting">
+CREATE VIEW phone_number AS
+ SELECT person, phone FROM phone_data WHERE phone NOT LIKE '412%';
+</pre><p>
+ This view might seem secure, since the rule system will rewrite any
+ <code class="command">SELECT</code> from <code class="literal">phone_number</code> into a
+ <code class="command">SELECT</code> from <code class="literal">phone_data</code> and add the
+ qualification that only entries where <code class="literal">phone</code> does not begin
+ with 412 are wanted. But if the user can create their own functions,
+ it is not difficult to convince the planner to execute the user-defined
+ function prior to the <code class="function">NOT LIKE</code> expression.
+ For example:
+</p><pre class="programlisting">
+CREATE FUNCTION tricky(text, text) RETURNS bool AS $$
+BEGIN
+ RAISE NOTICE '% =&gt; %', $1, $2;
+ RETURN true;
+END;
+$$ LANGUAGE plpgsql COST 0.0000000000000000000001;
+
+SELECT * FROM phone_number WHERE tricky(person, phone);
+</pre><p>
+ Every person and phone number in the <code class="literal">phone_data</code> table will be
+ printed as a <code class="literal">NOTICE</code>, because the planner will choose to
+ execute the inexpensive <code class="function">tricky</code> function before the
+ more expensive <code class="function">NOT LIKE</code>. Even if the user is
+ prevented from defining new functions, built-in functions can be used in
+ similar attacks. (For example, most casting functions include their
+ input values in the error messages they produce.)
+</p><p>
+ Similar considerations apply to update rules. In the examples of
+ the previous section, the owner of the tables in the example
+ database could grant the privileges <code class="literal">SELECT</code>,
+ <code class="literal">INSERT</code>, <code class="literal">UPDATE</code>, and <code class="literal">DELETE</code> on
+ the <code class="literal">shoelace</code> view to someone else, but only
+ <code class="literal">SELECT</code> on <code class="literal">shoelace_log</code>. The rule action to
+ write log entries will still be executed successfully, and that
+ other user could see the log entries. But they could not create fake
+ entries, nor could they manipulate or remove existing ones. In this
+ case, there is no possibility of subverting the rules by convincing
+ the planner to alter the order of operations, because the only rule
+ which references <code class="literal">shoelace_log</code> is an unqualified
+ <code class="literal">INSERT</code>. This might not be true in more complex scenarios.
+</p><p>
+ When it is necessary for a view to provide row-level security, the
+ <code class="literal">security_barrier</code> attribute should be applied to
+ the view. This prevents maliciously-chosen functions and operators from
+ being passed values from rows until after the view has done its work. For
+ example, if the view shown above had been created like this, it would
+ be secure:
+</p><pre class="programlisting">
+CREATE VIEW phone_number WITH (security_barrier) AS
+ SELECT person, phone FROM phone_data WHERE phone NOT LIKE '412%';
+</pre><p>
+ Views created with the <code class="literal">security_barrier</code> may perform
+ far worse than views created without this option. In general, there is
+ no way to avoid this: the fastest possible plan must be rejected
+ if it may compromise security. For this reason, this option is not
+ enabled by default.
+</p><p>
+ The query planner has more flexibility when dealing with functions that
+ have no side effects. Such functions are referred to as <code class="literal">LEAKPROOF</code>, and
+ include many simple, commonly used operators, such as many equality
+ operators. The query planner can safely allow such functions to be evaluated
+ at any point in the query execution process, since invoking them on rows
+ invisible to the user will not leak any information about the unseen rows.
+ Further, functions which do not take arguments or which are not passed any
+ arguments from the security barrier view do not have to be marked as
+ <code class="literal">LEAKPROOF</code> to be pushed down, as they never receive data
+ from the view. In contrast, a function that might throw an error depending
+ on the values received as arguments (such as one that throws an error in the
+ event of overflow or division by zero) is not leak-proof, and could provide
+ significant information about the unseen rows if applied before the security
+ view's row filters.
+</p><p>
+ It is important to understand that even a view created with the
+ <code class="literal">security_barrier</code> option is intended to be secure only
+ in the limited sense that the contents of the invisible tuples will not be
+ passed to possibly-insecure functions. The user may well have other means
+ of making inferences about the unseen data; for example, they can see the
+ query plan using <code class="command">EXPLAIN</code>, or measure the run time of
+ queries against the view. A malicious attacker might be able to infer
+ something about the amount of unseen data, or even gain some information
+ about the data distribution or most common values (since these things may
+ affect the run time of the plan; or even, since they are also reflected in
+ the optimizer statistics, the choice of plan). If these types of "covert
+ channel" attacks are of concern, it is probably unwise to grant any access
+ to the data at all.
+</p></div><div class="navfooter"><hr /><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="rules-update.html" title="41.4. Rules on INSERT, UPDATE, and DELETE">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="rules.html" title="Chapter 41. The Rule System">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="rules-status.html" title="41.6. Rules and Command Status">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">41.4. Rules on <code class="command">INSERT</code>, <code class="command">UPDATE</code>, and <code class="command">DELETE</code> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="index.html" title="PostgreSQL 15.4 Documentation">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> 41.6. Rules and Command Status</td></tr></table></div></body></html> \ No newline at end of file