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Mitigation Strategies Analysis for rabbitmq/rabbitmq-server

Mitigation Strategy: Disable Default Guest User

1. Disable Default Guest User

  • Description:

    1. Locate the RabbitMQ configuration file (rabbitmq.conf or advanced.config).
    2. Open the configuration file.
    3. Set loopback_users = none (advanced format) or {rabbit, [{loopback_users, []}]}. (Erlang term format).
    4. Save the file.
    5. Restart the RabbitMQ server.
    6. Verify by attempting to connect with the guest user.

  • Threats Mitigated:

    • Unauthorized Access (Critical): Prevents use of the default guest user/password.
    • Privilege Escalation (High): If guest has excessive permissions.

  • Impact:

    • Unauthorized Access: Risk reduced from Critical to Low.
    • Privilege Escalation: Risk reduced from High to Low.

  • Currently Implemented: Implemented in production via Ansible playbook rabbitmq_config.yml.

  • Missing Implementation: Missing in the staging environment.

Mitigation Strategy: Strong, Unique Credentials (within RabbitMQ)

2. Strong, Unique Credentials (within RabbitMQ)

  • Description:

    1. Identify all RabbitMQ user accounts.
    2. Generate strong, unique passwords for each user (password manager recommended).
    3. Update passwords using rabbitmqctl change_password <username> <new_password>.
    4. Document passwords securely. Note: This focuses on managing passwords within RabbitMQ. External password policies are not directly RabbitMQ-server related.

  • Threats Mitigated:

    • Unauthorized Access (High): Reduces risk of password guessing/brute-forcing.
    • Credential Stuffing (High): Prevents reuse of stolen credentials.

  • Impact:

    • Unauthorized Access: Risk reduced from High to Medium.
    • Credential Stuffing: Risk reduced from High to Medium.

  • Currently Implemented: Partially. Strong passwords used in production, managed via password manager.

  • Missing Implementation: Some dev/test environments use weak passwords.

Mitigation Strategy: Limit User Permissions (Principle of Least Privilege)

3. Limit User Permissions (Principle of Least Privilege)

  • Description:

    1. Identify user roles (producers, consumers, admins).
    2. Define minimum necessary permissions for each role:
      • Virtual Host Access.
      • Configure Permissions (exchanges/queues).
      • Write Permissions (exchanges).
      • Read Permissions (queues).
    3. Use RabbitMQ's permission model (regular expressions) to define permissions. Be specific; avoid broad wildcards. Example: rabbitmqctl set_permissions -p /my_vhost my_user "" "my_queue" ".*".
    4. Create separate user accounts for each role.
    5. Regularly review and audit permissions.

  • Threats Mitigated:

    • Privilege Escalation (High): Limits access for compromised accounts.
    • Data Breach (Medium): Reduces potential damage from compromised accounts.
    • Accidental Misconfiguration (Medium): Reduces risk of accidental resource deletion/modification.

  • Impact:

    • Privilege Escalation: Risk reduced from High to Low.
    • Data Breach: Risk reduced from Medium to Low.
    • Accidental Misconfiguration: Risk reduced from Medium to Low.

  • Currently Implemented: Partially. Basic role separation exists, but permissions are not granular enough.

  • Missing Implementation: Permissions are too broad in many cases. Comprehensive review needed.

Mitigation Strategy: TLS/SSL Encryption (Server Configuration)

4. TLS/SSL Encryption (Server Configuration)

  • Description:

    1. Obtain TLS/SSL certificates.
    2. Configure RabbitMQ in rabbitmq.conf: 
      listeners.ssl.default = 5671
ssl_options.cacertfile = /path/to/ca_certificate.pem
ssl_options.certfile   = /path/to/server_certificate.pem
ssl_options.keyfile    = /path/to/server_key.pem
ssl_options.verify     = verify_peer
ssl_options.fail_if_no_peer_cert = true
    3. Restart RabbitMQ. Note: This focuses on the server-side TLS configuration. Client configuration is not included here.
    4. For cluster, configure inter-node communication to use TLS.

  • Threats Mitigated:

    • Eavesdropping (High): Prevents intercepting messages.
    • Man-in-the-Middle (MitM) Attacks (High): Prevents impersonation/modification.
    • Data Breach (Medium): Protects data in transit.

  • Impact:

    • Eavesdropping: Risk reduced from High to Low.
    • Man-in-the-Middle Attacks: Risk reduced from High to Low.
    • Data Breach: Risk reduced from Medium to Low (for data in transit).

  • Currently Implemented: Implemented for client-to-server in production. Self-signed certs in dev/test.

  • Missing Implementation: Inter-node communication not yet secured with TLS.

Mitigation Strategy: Connection Limits

5. Connection Limits

  • Description:

    1. Determine a reasonable maximum number of concurrent connections.
    2. In rabbitmq.conf, set max_connections = <value>. Example: max_connections = 1024.
    3. Save and restart RabbitMQ.
    4. Monitor connection counts.

  • Threats Mitigated:

    • Denial of Service (DoS) (High): Prevents connection exhaustion.

  • Impact:

    • Denial of Service (DoS): Risk reduced from High to Medium.

  • Currently Implemented: Implemented with max_connections = 1024 in all environments.

  • Missing Implementation: No per-user connection limits.

Mitigation Strategy: Message Rate Limiting (Queue Length Limit - Server-Side)

6. Message Rate Limiting (Queue Length Limit - Server-Side)

  • Description:

    1. Identify queues susceptible to flooding.
    2. Determine a reasonable maximum queue length.
    3. Set the x-max-length argument when creating/modifying the queue. Example (using rabbitmqctl): rabbitmqctl set_policy -p /my_vhost my_queue_limit "^my_queue$" '{"max-length": 1000}' --apply-to queues.
    4. Monitor queue lengths.

  • Threats Mitigated:

    • Denial of Service (DoS) (Medium): Prevents queue flooding.
    • Resource Exhaustion (Medium): Limits memory/disk usage by queues.

  • Impact:

    • Denial of Service (DoS): Risk reduced from Medium to Low.
    • Resource Exhaustion: Risk reduced from Medium to Low.

  • Currently Implemented: Implemented on a few critical queues in production.

  • Missing Implementation: Not consistently applied to all queues.

Mitigation Strategy: Resource Alarms (Memory and Disk)

7. Resource Alarms (Memory and Disk)

  • Description:

    1. Determine appropriate memory and disk space thresholds.
    2. Configure vm_memory_high_watermark.relative in rabbitmq.conf. Example: vm_memory_high_watermark.relative = 0.4.
    3. Configure disk_free_limit.absolute in rabbitmq.conf. Example: disk_free_limit.absolute = 50MB. Note: This focuses on configuring the alarms within RabbitMQ. External monitoring/alerting systems are not included.
    4. Regularly review and adjust thresholds.

  • Threats Mitigated:

    • Denial of Service (DoS) (High): Provides early warning of resource exhaustion.
    • System Instability (High): Prevents crashes due to resource exhaustion.

  • Impact:

    • Denial of Service (DoS): Risk reduced from High to Medium.
    • System Instability: Risk reduced from High to Low.

  • Currently Implemented: Basic alarms configured.

  • Missing Implementation: Thresholds may need fine-tuning.

Mitigation Strategy: Minimize Enabled Plugins (Server-Side Action)

8. Minimize Enabled Plugins (Server-Side Action)

  • Description:

    1. List enabled plugins: rabbitmq-plugins list.
    2. Identify unnecessary plugins.
    3. Disable unnecessary plugins: rabbitmq-plugins disable <plugin_name>.
    4. Restart RabbitMQ.
    5. Regularly review.

  • Threats Mitigated:

    • Vulnerability Exploitation (Medium): Reduces attack surface.

  • Impact:

    • Vulnerability Exploitation: Risk reduced from Medium to Low.

  • Currently Implemented: Initial review done; unnecessary plugins disabled.

  • Missing Implementation: Regular reviews not yet part of standard procedures.

Mitigation Strategy: Secure Inter-node Communication (Clustering)

9. Secure Inter-node Communication (Clustering)

  • Description:

    1. Obtain TLS/SSL certificates.
    2. Configure ssl_options for the rabbit application in the configuration file (rabbitmq.conf or advanced.config). This involves specifying paths to certificate and key files, similar to client-server TLS configuration, but within the rabbit application section.
    3. Restart RabbitMQ nodes.

  • Threats Mitigated:

    • Eavesdropping (High): Prevents interception of inter-node traffic.
    • Man-in-the-Middle (MitM) Attacks (High): Prevents impersonation or modification of cluster communication.
    • Data Breach (Medium): Protects cluster management and data replication traffic.

  • Impact:

    • Eavesdropping: Risk reduced from High to Low.
    • Man-in-the-Middle Attacks: Risk reduced from High to Low.
    • Data Breach: Risk reduced from Medium to Low (for inter-node traffic).

  • Currently Implemented: Not implemented.

  • Missing Implementation: This is a critical missing piece for cluster security.