threat-modeling.md

Threat Model Analysis for chroma-core/chroma

Threat: Data Breach via Underlying Storage Access

• Threat: Data Breach via Underlying Storage Access
• Description: An attacker gains unauthorized access to the server or storage medium where ChromaDB persists its data. They could then directly access and exfiltrate sensitive vector embeddings, metadata, and documents stored by ChromaDB. This is possible if the storage is not properly secured, allowing attackers to bypass ChromaDB's API and access the raw data.
• Impact: Confidentiality breach, exposure of sensitive data including vector embeddings, metadata, and potentially original documents. Reputational damage, legal and regulatory penalties.
• Chroma Component Affected: Persistence Layer (Disk-based persistence, potentially cloud storage integrations)
• Risk Severity: High
• Mitigation Strategies:
  • Implement strong access controls (file system permissions, cloud IAM policies) on the underlying storage.
  • Encrypt data at rest for the persistent storage used by ChromaDB.
  • Regularly audit storage access logs for suspicious activity.
  • Harden the server and infrastructure hosting ChromaDB.

Threat: Insufficient Data Sanitization leading to Information Disclosure

• Threat: Insufficient Data Sanitization leading to Information Disclosure
• Description: Sensitive information is embedded within documents or metadata indexed by ChromaDB without proper sanitization. An attacker, even with legitimate access to the search API, could craft queries to retrieve search results that inadvertently expose this sensitive information. This is a direct consequence of indexing unsanitized data within ChromaDB.
• Impact: Confidentiality breach, exposure of sensitive information through search results. Reputational damage, legal and regulatory penalties.
• Chroma Component Affected: Indexing Module, Query Engine (search results retrieval)
• Risk Severity: High
• Mitigation Strategies:
  • Implement thorough data sanitization and redaction processes before indexing data in ChromaDB.
  • Carefully review the metadata and document content being indexed to identify and remove or mask sensitive information.
  • Consider using data masking or tokenization techniques for sensitive data before indexing.
  • Implement access controls on the search API to restrict access to sensitive collections or data based on user roles.

Threat: API Injection Vulnerabilities

• Threat: API Injection Vulnerabilities
• Description: An attacker exploits vulnerabilities in the application's code that constructs ChromaDB queries. By manipulating user inputs, they inject malicious commands or queries into the ChromaDB API. This can directly impact ChromaDB by leading to unauthorized data access, modification, or denial of service within the vector database.
• Impact: Unauthorized data access, data modification or deletion within ChromaDB, potential denial of service, and in severe cases, potential compromise of the ChromaDB instance.
• Chroma Component Affected: API Interface, Query Parser
• Risk Severity: High
• Mitigation Strategies:
  • Implement robust input validation and sanitization for all user inputs used to construct ChromaDB queries.
  • Use parameterized queries or prepared statements when interacting with ChromaDB to prevent injection attacks.
  • Follow secure coding practices when building application logic that interacts with ChromaDB.
  • Adopt a principle of least privilege when granting permissions to the application interacting with ChromaDB.

Threat: Insufficient Authentication and Authorization for API Access

• Threat: Insufficient Authentication and Authorization for API Access
• Description: Lack of proper authentication and authorization mechanisms to control access to ChromaDB functionalities. Unauthorized users can directly interact with the ChromaDB API, potentially accessing, modifying, or deleting data. This is a critical issue as ChromaDB itself has limited built-in authentication, relying on the application to implement these controls.
• Impact: Unauthorized data access, data modification or deletion within ChromaDB, potential data breach, and compromise of data integrity.
• Chroma Component Affected: API Interface, Access Control Module (application-level implementation required)
• Risk Severity: High
• Mitigation Strategies:
  • Implement strong authentication mechanisms to verify the identity of users accessing ChromaDB functionalities (e.g., API keys, OAuth 2.0).
  • Enforce role-based access control (RBAC) or attribute-based access control (ABAC) to restrict user access to specific ChromaDB operations and data based on their roles and permissions.
  • Securely manage API keys or credentials used to access ChromaDB, avoiding hardcoding them in the application.
  • Regularly review and audit access control configurations.

Threat: Vulnerabilities in ChromaDB Dependencies

• Threat: Vulnerabilities in ChromaDB Dependencies
• Description: Critical security vulnerabilities are discovered in the third-party libraries and dependencies used by ChromaDB. Attackers could exploit these vulnerabilities to directly compromise ChromaDB or the application using it. This is a direct risk because ChromaDB relies on external libraries, and vulnerabilities in these can directly affect ChromaDB's security.
• Impact: Potential compromise of ChromaDB instance, data breach, denial of service, or other severe security incidents depending on the nature of the vulnerability.
• Chroma Component Affected: Dependencies (various libraries used by ChromaDB)
• Risk Severity: High
• Mitigation Strategies:
  • Regularly update ChromaDB and its dependencies to the latest versions to patch known vulnerabilities.
  • Use dependency scanning tools to identify and monitor for vulnerabilities in ChromaDB's dependencies.
  • Subscribe to security advisories for ChromaDB and its dependencies to stay informed about potential vulnerabilities.
  • Implement a vulnerability management process to address identified vulnerabilities promptly.