App security groups in Cloud Foundry

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App Security Groups (ASGs) are a collection of egress rules that enable you to specify the protocols, ports, and IP address ranges where app or task instances send traffic.

ASGs define allow rules, and their order of evaluation is unimportant when multiple ASGs apply to the same space or deployment. The platform sets up rules to filter and log outbound network traffic from app and task instances. ASGs apply to both buildpack-based and Docker-based apps and tasks.

Staging and running ASGs

Admins can define a staging ASG for app and task staging, and a running ASG for app and task runtime.

When apps or tasks begin staging, they require traffic rules permissive enough to allow them to pull resources from the network. A running app or task no longer needs to pull resources, so traffic rules can be more restrictive and secure. To distinguish between these two security requirements, you can define a staging ASG for app and task staging with more permissive rules, and a running ASG for app and task runtime with less permissive rules.

Platform wide and space scoped ASGs

To provide granular control when securing a deployment, you can assign platform-wide ASGs that apply to all app and task instances for the entire deployment, or space-scoped ASGs that apply only to apps and tasks in a particular space.

In environments with both platform-wide and space-specific ASGs, the ASGs for a particular space are combined with the platform ASGs to determine the effective rules for that space. Any of the permitted traffic in the set of applicable ASGs is then effectively permitted for that app.

Dynamic ASGs

Dynamic ASGs allow ASGs to be applied to apps without the need for an application restart. Containers using the Silk CNI or NSX-T update their ASGs dynamically; Windows apps and apps using other CNIs do not support Dynamic ASGs at this time.

Dynamic ASGs are enabled with cf deployment v20.0.0 and higher through cf-networking-release 3.0.0. It is recommended to use Dynamic ASGs with capi-release v1.126.0 or later for improved performance on the /v3/security_groups APIs.

To deactivate Dynamic ASGs: use the ops file operations/disable-dynamic-asgs.yml from cf-deployment v20.0.0 or higher.

Simplifying ASGs with a services subnet

ASGs can be complicated to configure correctly, especially when the specific IP addresses listed in a group change.

To simplify securing a deployment while still allowing apps reach external services, operators can deploy the services into a subnet that is separate from their Cloud Foundry deployment, then create ASGs for the apps that allow those service subnets, while denying access to any VM hosting other apps.

For examples of typical ASGs, see Typical ASGs.

Default ASGs

Cloud Foundry preconfigures two ASGs: public_networks and dns.

Unless you modify these before your initial deployment, these ASGs are applied by default to all containers in your deployment.

• public_networks: This group allows access to public networks, and blocks access to private networks and link local addresses. Cloud Foundry blocks outgoing traffic to the following IP address ranges by specifically allowing traffic to all other addresses:

  • 10.0.0.0 - 10.255.255.255
  • 169.254.0.0 - 169.254.255.255
  • 172.16.0.0 - 172.31.255.255
  • 192.168.0.0 - 192.168.255.255

• dns: This group allows access to DNS on port 53 for any IP address. The default ASGs are defined in the cf-deployment.yml file as follows:

    security_group_definitions:
    - name: public_networks
      rules:
      - destination: 0.0.0.0-9.255.255.255
        protocol: all
      - destination: 11.0.0.0-169.253.255.255
        protocol: all
      - destination: 169.255.0.0-172.15.255.255
        protocol: all
      - destination: 172.32.0.0-192.167.255.255
        protocol: all
      - destination: 192.169.0.0-255.255.255.255
        protocol: all
    - name: dns
      rules:
      - destination: 0.0.0.0/0
        ports: '53'
        protocol: tcp
      - destination: 0.0.0.0/0
        ports: '53'
        protocol: udp
  

  Modify the default ASGs to block outbound traffic as necessary for your installation. To see how the ASGs are defined by default, see the cf-deployment.yml file on GitHub.

ASG sets

ASGs are applied by configuring ASG sets differentiated by scope, platform-wide or space specific, and lifecycle, staging or running.

Currently, the following ASG sets exist in Cloud Foundry:

• Platform-wide staging ASG set, also called “default-staging”
• Platform-wide running ASG set, also called “default-running”
• Space-scoped staging ASG set
• Space-scoped running ASG set

In environments with both platform-wide and space-specific ASG sets, combine the ASG sets for a particular space with the platform ASG sets to determine the rules for that space.

The following table indicates the differences between the four sets:

Typically, ASGs applied during the staging lifecycle are more permissive than the ASGs applied during the running lifecycle. This is because staging often requires access to different resources, such as dependencies.

You use different commands to apply an ASG to each of the four sets.

To apply a staging ASG to apps within a space, you must use cf CLI v6.28.0 or later.

For more information, see Managing ASGs with the cf CLI.

Structure and attributes of ASGs

ASG rules are specified as a JSON array of ASG objects. An ASG object has the following attributes:

Managing ASGs

The following table outlines the flow of tasks that you implement over the lifecycle of ASGs.

For information about procedures for each of these tasks, see Managing ASGs with cf CLI.

Managing ASGs with cf CLI

Learn about the commands you need to create and manage ASGs.

Many of the following procedures require the Cloud Foundry Command Line Interface (cf CLI). To download the cf CLI, see Installing the cf CLI.

Viewing ASGs

To view information about existing ASGs, run the following commands:

Creating ASGs

To create an ASG:

1. Create a rules file: a JSON-formatted single array containing objects that describe the rules. See the following example, which allows ICMP traffic of code 1 and type 0 to all destinations, and TCP traffic to 10.0.11.0/24 on ports 80 and 443. For more information, see The Structure and Attributes of ASGs.

   [
     {
       "protocol": "icmp",
       "destination": "0.0.0.0/0",
       "type": 0,
       "code": 0
     },
     {
       "protocol": "tcp",
       "destination": "10.0.11.0/24,8.8.8.8",
       "ports": "80,443",
       "log": true,
       "description": "Allow http and https traffic to ZoneA"
     }
   ]
   

2. Run:

   cf create-security-group ASG PATH-TO-RULES-FILE.json
   

   Where:

   • ASG is the name of your ASG.
   • PATH-TO-RULES-FILE.json is the absolute or relative path to a rules file.

   In the following example, EXAMPLE-ASG is the name of an ASG, and ~/workspace/example-asg.json is the path to a rules file:

   cf create-security-group EXAMPLE-ASG ~/workspace/example-asg.json
   

After the ASG is created, you must bind it to an ASG set before it takes effect. For more information, see Bind ASGs.

Binding ASGs

Binding an ASG does not affect started apps unless you have Dynamic ASGs enabled. If deactivated, you need to run cf restart for each app. To restart all of the apps in an org or a space, use the app-restarter cf CLI plug-in.

To apply an ASG, you must bind it to an ASG set.

Platform-wide staging ASG set

To bind an ASG to the platform wide staging ASG set:

1. Run:

   cf bind-staging-security-group ASG
   

   Where ASG is the name of your ASG.

Platform-wide running ASG set

To bind an ASG to the platform-wide running ASG set:

1. Run:

   cf bind-running-security-group ASG
   

   Where ASG is the name of your ASG.

Space-scoped running ASG set

To bind an ASG to a space-scoped running ASG set:

1. Run:

   cf bind-security-group ASG ORG --space SPACE
   

   Where:

   • ASG is the name of your ASG.
   • ORG is the name of the org where you want to bind the ASG set.
   • SPACE is the name of the space where you want to bind the ASG set.

Space-scoped staging ASG set

To bind an ASG to a space scoped staging ASG set:

1. Run:

   cf bind-security-group ASG ORG --space SPACE --lifecycle staging
   

   Where:

   • ASG is the name of your ASG.
   • ORG is the name of the org where you want to bind the ASG set.
   • SPACE is the name of the space where you want to bind the ASG set.

Update ASGs

Updating an ASG does not affect started apps unless you have Dynamic ASGs activated. If deactivated, you need to restart the apps. To restart all of the apps in an org or a space, use the app-restarter cf CLI plug-in.

To update an existing ASG: 1. Edit the ASG rules in the JSON file you created in Create ASGs.

1. Run:

   cf update-security-group ASG PATH-TO-RULES-FILE.json
   

   Where:

   • ASG is name of the existing ASG you want to change.
   • PATH-TO-RULES-FILE.json is the absolute or relative path to a rules file.

   In the following example, example-asg is the name of an ASG, and ~/workspace/example-asg-v2.json is the path to a rules file:

   cf update-security-group example-asg ~/workspace/example-asg-v2.json
   

Unbind ASGs

Unbinding an ASG does not affect started apps unless you have Dynamic ASGs enabled. If deactivated, you need to restart the apps. To restart all of the apps in an org or a space, use the app-restarter cf CLI plug-in.

Platform-wide staging ASG set

To unbind an ASG from the platform-wide staging ASG set:

1. Run:

   cf unbind-staging-security-group ASG
   

   Where ASG is the name of your ASG.

Platform-wide running ASG set

To unbind an ASG from the platform-wide running ASG set:

1. Run:

   cf unbind-running-security-group ASG
   

   Where ASG is the name of your ASG.

Space-scoped ASG set

To unbind an ASG from a specific space:

1. Run:

   cf unbind-security-group ASG ORG --space SPACE --lifecycle running
   

   Where:

   • ASG is the name of your ASG.
   • ORG is the org where you want to unbind the ASG set.
   • SPACE is the space where you want to unbind the ASG set.
   • To unbind from the staging ASG set, replace running with staging.

Delete ASGs

You can only delete unbound ASGs. To unbind ASGs, see Unbind ASGs.

To delete an ASG:

1. Run:

   cf delete-security-group ASG
   

   Where ASG is the name of your ASG.

Typical ASGs

The following table describes examples of typical ASGs. Configure your ASGs in accordance with your organization’s network access policy for untrusted apps.

DNS

To resolve hostnames to IP addresses, apps require DNS server connectivity, which typically use port 53. Admins must create or update a dns ASG with appropriate rules. Admins can further restrict the DNS servers to specific IP addresses or ranges of IP addresses.

The following is an example dns ASG:

[
  {
    "protocol": "tcp",
    "destination": "0.0.0.0/0",
    "ports": "53"
  },
  {
    "protocol": "udp",
    "destination": "0.0.0.0/0",
    "ports": "53"
  }
]

Public networks

Apps often require public network connectivity to retrieve app dependencies, or to integrate with services available on public networks. Example app dependencies include public Maven repositories, NPM, RubyGems, and Docker registries.

You must exclude IaaS metadata endpoints. For example, 169.254.169.254, because the metadata endpoint can expose sensitive environment information to untrusted apps. The following public_networks example accounts for this recommendation.

The following is an example public_networks ASG:

[
  {
    "destination": "0.0.0.0-9.255.255.255",
    "protocol": "all"
  },
  {
    "destination": "11.0.0.0-169.253.255.255",
    "protocol": "all"
  },
  {
    "destination": "169.255.0.0-172.15.255.255",
    "protocol": "all"
  },
  {
    "destination": "172.32.0.0-192.167.255.255",
    "protocol": "all"
  },
  {
    "destination": "192.169.0.0-255.255.255.255",
    "protocol": "all"
  }
]

Private networks

Network connections that are commonly allowable in private networks include endpoints such as proxy servers, Docker registries, load balancers, databases, messaging servers, directory servers, and file servers. Configure appropriate private network ASGs as appropriate. You might find it helpful to use a naming convention with private_networks as part of the ASG name, such as private_networks_databases.

You must exclude any private networks and IP addresses that app and task instances must not have access to.

The following is an example private_networks ASG:

[
  {
    "protocol": "tcp",
    "destination": "10.0.0.0-10.255.255.255",
    "ports": "443"
  },
  {
    "protocol": "tcp",
    "destination": "172.16.0.0-172.31.255.255",
    "ports": "443"
  },
  {
    "protocol": "tcp",
    "destination": "192.168.0.0-192.168.255.255",
    "ports": "443"
  }
]

ASGs and Performance on Windows

Each ASG bound to an app results in one or more network policy created on the Host, depending on the number of destinations (ranges and CIDRs count as one destination each). Windows apps with ASGs to many destinations will experience increased latency when the app is starting. Windows apps with ASGs to more than 1000 destinations may fail to start.

Marketplace Services

Each installed Marketplace Service requires its own set of ASG rules to function properly. To determine which ASG rules it requires, see the installation instructions for each installed Marketplace Service. For more information about how to provision and integrate services, see Services Overview.

About the ASG Creator tool

The ASG Creator is a command line tool that you can use to create JSON rules files. The ASG Creator lets you specify IP addresses, CIDRs, and IP address ranges that you want to disallow traffic to, as well as the addresses that you want to allow traffic to. Based on these disallow/allow (exclude/include) lists that you provide as input, the ASG Creator formulates a JSON file of allow rules.

In turn, the JSON file is the input for the cf create-security-group command that creates an ASG.

To download the latest release of the ASG Creator, see the Cloud Foundry Incubator repository on GitHub.

ASG logging

For information about how you can use ASGs to correlate emitted logs back to an app, see How to use Application Security Group (ASG) logging in the Tanzu Support Hub.