Security

Secure Feast with SSL/TLS, Authentication and Authorization.

This page applies to Feast 0.7. The content may be out of date for Feast 0.8+

Overview

Overview of Feast's Security Methods.

Feast supports the following security methods:

• SSL/TLS on messaging between Feast Core, Feast Online Serving and Feast SDKs.
• Authentication to Feast Core and Serving based on Open ID Connect ID tokens.
• Authorization based on project membership and delegating authorization grants to external Authorization Server.

Important considerations when integrating Authentication/Authorization.

SSL/TLS

Feast supports SSL/TLS encrypted inter-service communication among Feast Core, Feast Online Serving, and Feast SDKs.

Configuring SSL/TLS on Feast Core and Feast Serving

The following properties configure SSL/TLS. These properties are located in their corresponding application.ymlfiles:

Configuration Property	Description
grpc.server.security.enabled	Enables SSL/TLS functionality if true
grpc.server.security.certificateChain	Provide the path to certificate chain.
grpc.server.security.privateKey	Provide the to private key.

Read more on enabling SSL/TLS in the gRPC starter docs.

Configuring SSL/TLS on Python SDK/CLI

To enable SSL/TLS in the Feast Python SDK or Feast CLI, set the config options via feast config:

Configuration Option	Description
core_enable_ssl	Enables SSL/TLS functionality on connections to Feast core if true
serving_enable_ssl	Enables SSL/TLS functionality on connections to Feast Online Serving if true
core_server_ssl_cert	Optional. Specifies the path of the root certificate used to verify Core Service's identity. If omitted, uses system certificates.
serving_server_ssl_cert	Optional. Specifies the path of the root certificate used to verify Serving Service's identity. If omitted, uses system certificates.

The Python SDK automatically uses SSL/TLS when connecting to Feast Core and Feast Online Serving via port 443.

Configuring SSL/TLS on Go SDK

Configure SSL/TLS on the Go SDK by passing configuration via SecurityConfig:

cli, err := feast.NewSecureGrpcClient("localhost", 6566, feast.SecurityConfig{
    EnableTLS: true,
         TLSCertPath: "/path/to/cert.pem",
})Option

Config Option	Description
EnableTLS	Enables SSL/TLS functionality when connecting to Feast if true
TLSCertPath	Optional. Provides the path of the root certificate used to verify Feast Service's identity. If omitted, uses system certificates.

Configuring SSL/TLS on Java SDK

Configure SSL/TLS on the Feast Java SDK by passing configuration via SecurityConfig:

FeastClient client = FeastClient.createSecure("localhost", 6566, 
    SecurityConfig.newBuilder()
      .setTLSEnabled(true)
      .setCertificatePath(Optional.of("/path/to/cert.pem"))
      .build());

Config Option	Description
setTLSEnabled()	Enables SSL/TLS functionality when connecting to Feast if true
setCertificatesPath()	Optional. Set the path of the root certificate used to verify Feast Service's identity. If omitted, uses system certificates.

Authentication

To prevent man in the middle attacks, we recommend that SSL/TLS be implemented prior to authentication.

Authentication can be implemented to identify and validate client requests to Feast Core and Feast Online Serving. Currently, Feast uses Open ID Connect (OIDC) ID tokens (i.e. Google Open ID Connect) to authenticate client requests.

Configuring Authentication in Feast Core and Feast Online Serving

Authentication can be configured for Feast Core and Feast Online Serving via properties in their corresponding application.yml files:

Configuration Property	Description
feast.security.authentication.enabled	Enables Authentication functionality if true
feast.security.authentication.provider	Authentication Provider type. Currently only supports jwt
feast.security.authentication.option.jwkEndpointURI	HTTPS URL used by Feast to retrieved the JWK used to verify OIDC ID tokens.

jwkEndpointURIis set to retrieve Google's OIDC JWK by default, allowing OIDC ID tokens issued by Google to be used for authentication.

Behind the scenes, Feast Core and Feast Online Serving authenticate by:

• Extracting the OIDC ID token TOKENfrom gRPC metadata submitted with request:

('authorization', 'Bearer: TOKEN')

• Validates token's authenticity using the JWK retrieved from the jwkEndpointURI

Authenticating Serving with Feast Core

Feast Online Serving communicates with Feast Core during normal operation. When both authentication and authorization are enabled on Feast Core, Feast Online Serving is forced to authenticate its requests to Feast Core. Otherwise, Feast Online Serving produces an Authentication failure error when connecting to Feast Core.

Properties used to configure Serving authentication via application.yml:

Configuration Property	Description
feast.core-authentication.enabled	Requires Feast Online Serving to authenticate when communicating with Feast Core.
feast.core-authentication.provider	Selects provider Feast Online Serving uses to retrieve credentials then used to authenticate requests to Feast Core. Valid providers are google and oauth.

Google Provider

Google Provider automatically extracts the credential from the credential JSON file.

• Set GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS environment variable to the path of the credential in the JSON file.

OAuth Provider

OAuth Provider makes an OAuth client credentials request to obtain the credential. OAuth requires the following options to be set at feast.security.core-authentication.options.:

Configuration Property	Description

oauth_url	Target URL receiving the client-credentials request.

grant_type	OAuth grant type. Set as client_credentials

client_id	Client Id used in the client-credentials request.

client_secret	Client secret used in the client-credentials request.

audience	Target audience of the credential. Set to host URL of Feast Core. (i.e. https://localhost if Feast Core listens on localhost).

jwkEndpointURI	HTTPS URL used to retrieve a JWK that can be used to decode the credential.

Enabling Authentication in Python SDK/CLI

Configure the Feast Python SDK and Feast CLI to use authentication via feast config:

$ feast config set enable_auth true

Configuration Option	Description
enable_auth	Enables authentication functionality if set to true.
auth_provider	Use an authentication provider to obtain a credential for authentication. Currently supports google and oauth.
auth_token	Manually specify a static token for use in authentication. Overrules auth_provider if both are set.

Google Provider

Google Provider automatically finds and uses Google Credentials to authenticate requests:

• Google Provider automatically uses established credentials for authenticating requests if you are already authenticated with the gcloud CLI via:

$ gcloud auth application-default login

• Alternatively Google Provider can be configured to use the credentials in the JSON file viaGOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS environmental variable (Google Cloud Authentication documentation):

$ export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="path/to/key.json"

OAuth Provider

OAuth Provider makes an OAuth client credentials request to obtain the credential/token used to authenticate Feast requests. The OAuth provider requires the following config options to be set via feast config:

Configuration Property	Description

oauth_token_request_url	Target URL receiving the client-credentials request.

oauth_grant_type	OAuth grant type. Set as client_credentials

oauth_client_id	Client Id used in the client-credentials request.

oauth_client_secret	Client secret used in the client-credentials request.

oauth_audience	Target audience of the credential. Set to host URL of target Service. (https://localhost if Service listens on localhost).

Enabling Authentication in Go SDK

Configure the Feast Java SDK to use authentication by specifying the credential via SecurityConfig:

// error handling omitted.
// Use Google Credential as provider.
cred, _ := feast.NewGoogleCredential("localhost:6566")
cli, _ := feast.NewSecureGrpcClient("localhost", 6566, feast.SecurityConfig{
  // Specify the credential to provide tokens for Feast Authentication.  
    Credential: cred, 
})

Google Credential

Google Credential uses Service Account credentials JSON file set viaGOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS environmental variable (Google Cloud Authentication documentation) to obtain tokens for Authenticating Feast requests:

• Exporting GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS

$ export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="path/to/key.json"

• Create a Google Credential with target audience.

cred, _ := feast.NewGoogleCredential("localhost:6566")

Target audience of the credential should be set to host URL of target Service. (ie https://localhost if Service listens on localhost):

OAuth Credential

OAuth Credential makes an OAuth client credentials request to obtain the credential/token used to authenticate Feast requests:

• Create OAuth Credential with parameters:

cred := feast.NewOAuthCredential("localhost:6566", "client_id", "secret", "https://oauth.endpoint/auth")

Parameter	Description

audience	Target audience of the credential. Set to host URL of target Service. ( https://localhost if Service listens on localhost).

clientId	Client Id used in the client-credentials request.

clientSecret	Client secret used in the client-credentials request.

endpointURL	Target URL to make the client-credentials request to.

Enabling Authentication in Java SDK

Configure the Feast Java SDK to use authentication by setting credentials via SecurityConfig:

// Use GoogleAuthCredential as provider.
CallCredentials credentials = new GoogleAuthCredentials(
    Map.of("audience", "localhost:6566"));

FeastClient client = FeastClient.createSecure("localhost", 6566, 
    SecurityConfig.newBuilder()
      // Specify the credentials to provide tokens for Feast Authentication.  
      .setCredentials(Optional.of(creds))
      .build());

GoogleAuthCredentials

GoogleAuthCredentials uses Service Account credentials JSON file set viaGOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS environmental variable (Google Cloud authentication documentation) to obtain tokens for Authenticating Feast requests:

• Exporting GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS

$ export GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS="path/to/key.json"

• Create a Google Credential with target audience.

CallCredentials credentials = new GoogleAuthCredentials(
    Map.of("audience", "localhost:6566"));

Target audience of the credentials should be set to host URL of target Service. (ie https://localhost if Service listens on localhost):

OAuthCredentials

OAuthCredentials makes an OAuth client credentials request to obtain the credential/token used to authenticate Feast requests:

• Create OAuthCredentials with parameters:

CallCredentials credentials = new OAuthCredentials(Map.of(
  "audience": "localhost:6566",
  "grant_type", "client_credentials",
  "client_id", "some_id",
  "client_id", "secret",
  "oauth_url", "https://oauth.endpoint/auth",
  "jwkEndpointURI", "https://jwk.endpoint/jwk"));

Parameter	Description

audience	Target audience of the credential. Set to host URL of target Service. ( https://localhost if Service listens on localhost).

grant_type	OAuth grant type. Set as client_credentials

client_id	Client Id used in the client-credentials request.

client_secret	Client secret used in the client-credentials request.

oauth_url	Target URL to make the client-credentials request to obtain credential.

jwkEndpointURI	HTTPS URL used to retrieve a JWK that can be used to decode the credential.

Authorization

Authorization requires that authentication be configured to obtain a user identity for use in authorizing requests.

Authorization provides access control to FeatureTables and/or Features based on project membership. Users who are members of a project are authorized to:

• Create and/or Update a Feature Table in the Project.

• Retrieve Feature Values for Features in that Project.

Authorization API/Server

Feast Authorization Flow

Feast delegates Authorization grants to an external Authorization Server that implements the Authorization Open API specification.

• Feast checks whether a user is authorized to make a request by making a checkAccessRequest to the Authorization Server.

• The Authorization Server should return a AuthorizationResult with whether the user is allowed to make the request.

Authorization can be configured for Feast Core and Feast Online Serving via properties in their corresponding application.yml

Configuration Property	Description
feast.security.authorization.enabled	Enables authorization functionality if true.
feast.security.authorization.provider	Authentication Provider type. Currently only supports http
feast.security.authorization.option.authorizationUrl	URL endpoint of Authorization Server to make check access requests to.
feast.security.authorization.option.subjectClaim	Optional. Name of the claim of the to extract from the ID Token to include in the check access request as Subject.

This example of the Authorization Server with Keto can be used as a reference implementation for implementing an Authorization Server that Feast supports.

Authentication & Authorization

When using Authentication & Authorization, consider:

• Enabling Authentication without Authorization makes authentication optional. You can still send unauthenticated requests.

• Enabling Authorization forces all requests to be authenticated. Requests that are not authenticated are dropped.