Secret access audit logging

[ralyodio]

📋 Product Requirements Document

PRD: Secret access audit logging

Issue: #147
Milestone: Phase 4: Security
Labels: secrets-encryption, hacktoberfest

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PRD: Secret Access Audit Logging

Overview

The task of implementing secret access audit logging is pivotal for enhancing MeshHook's security framework, making it an indispensable feature for ensuring transparency, accountability, and compliance. This feature is designed to track and log every access to the secrets stored within MeshHook, including both reads and writes. It is directly aligned with the project’s goals of providing a secure, robust, and compliance-ready workflow engine that caters to the needs of regulated industries and security-conscious organizations. By adding audit logging, MeshHook will not only bolster its security posture but also foster trust among its users by providing them with visibility into how and when secrets are accessed.

Functional Requirements

1. Audit Log Entries: Automatically generate an audit log entry for every access (read/write) to secrets.
2. Log Details: Capture detailed information in each log entry, including:
   • Secret identifier
   • Timestamp of access
   • Identity of the accessor (user or service account)
   • Type of access (read/write)
   • IP address from which the access was made
3. Search and Filter Capability: Provide functionality to search and filter the audit logs by secret identifier, date range, accessor's identity, and type of access.
4. Access Control: Restrict access to the audit logs, ensuring that only users with designated permissions can view them.
5. Seamless Integration: The audit logging feature should integrate flawlessly with the existing secrets management module, without necessitating significant modifications to the current workflows.

Non-Functional Requirements

• Performance: Implement the audit logging feature ensuring minimal impact on the secret access performance.
• Security: Secure the audit logs against unauthorized access and tampering. Utilize secure storage and transmission mechanisms.
• Reliability: Ensure the audit log service is highly available, with a robust mechanism to handle failures gracefully, ensuring no data loss.
• Maintainability: Design the feature with future scalability in mind, ensuring that the system can handle increasing volumes of logs efficiently.

Technical Specifications

Architecture Context and Integration Points

• Integration with Secrets Vault: The audit logging feature will be tightly integrated with MeshHook's secrets management module, capturing all access to secrets.
• Storage Solution: Leverage the existing Postgres infrastructure for storing audit logs to maintain consistency and utilize Postgres's transactional integrity.
• Real-Time Monitoring: Utilize Supabase Realtime to enable real-time monitoring of audit logs, ensuring immediate visibility and alerting capabilities.

Implementation Approach

1. Schema Extension:
   • Create a new audit_logs table in Postgres, including columns for secret ID, access type, timestamp, user identity, and IP address.
2. Logging Mechanism:
   • Modify the secrets access and modification functions to include a step that writes an entry into the audit_logs table upon each access.
3. Query API:
   • Develop a new API endpoint (GET /api/audit-logs) to enable querying and filtering of audit logs.
4. Permission Management:
   • Update the access control system to include a new permission set for audit log access, ensuring only authorized personnel can view the logs.
5. Log Management:
   • Implement a log rotation and archiving strategy to manage storage efficiently while ensuring logs are retained as per compliance requirements.

Data Model Changes

• New audit_logs Table:
  • id SERIAL PRIMARY KEY
  • secret_id INT REFERENCES secrets(id)
  • access_type ENUM('read', 'write')
  • timestamp TIMESTAMP WITH TIME ZONE DEFAULT now()
  • user_identity VARCHAR(255)
  • ip_address VARCHAR(45)

API Endpoints

• Query Audit Logs:
  • GET /api/audit-logs: Fetches audit logs, supports filtering by secret_id, date_range, user_identity, and access_type.

Acceptance Criteria

• Audit log entry is created for every access (read/write) to secrets.
• Each audit log entry includes secret ID, access type, timestamp, user identity, and IP address.
• Functionality exists to query and filter audit logs by secret ID, date range, user identity, and access type.
• Only users with the appropriate permissions can access the audit log entries.
• Audit logging feature does not significantly impact the performance of secret accesses.

Dependencies and Prerequisites

• Access to MeshHook's existing Postgres database.
• Integration capability with Supabase Realtime for monitoring.
• Existing secrets management module for seamless integration.

Implementation Notes

Development Guidelines

• Adhere to MeshHook’s coding standards and best practices.
• Ensure new code is efficiently structured and well-documented.
• Cover the new functionality extensively with both unit and integration tests.
• Update the project's API documentation to include the new audit log querying endpoint.

Testing Strategy

• Unit Tests: Validate the functionality of audit log creation and query filtering.
• Integration Tests: Test the integration points with the secrets management module and the permissions system.
• Performance Tests: Benchmark the impact of audit logging on secret access operations to ensure compliance with performance requirements.

Security Considerations

• Ensure audit logs are immutable once written.
• Implement strict access controls to prevent unauthorized log access.
• Securely store and transmit log data to prevent interception or tampering.

Monitoring and Observability

• Set up monitoring for the audit log feature to track its performance and alert on failures.
• Implement logging and tracing for audit log operations to facilitate troubleshooting and performance tuning.

This PRD defines a clear, comprehensive roadmap for implementing secret access audit logging within MeshHook, ensuring the feature aligns with the project's security, performance, and usability standards.

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This PRD was AI-generated using gpt-4-turbo-preview from GitHub issue #147
Generated: 2025-10-10

📎 Generated Documentation

• 📄 PRD Document: 147-secret-access-audit-logging.md
• 🎨 PlantUML Diagram: 147-secret-access-audit-logging.puml
• 🖼️ Diagram Image: 147-secret-access-audit-logging.png

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This issue body was auto-generated from the PRD. Original issue content is preserved in the PRD document.
Last updated: 2025-10-10