Version: 2.2.0 (latest)

Authentication with JWT

You are reading the documentation for version 2 of FoalTS. Instructions for upgrading to this version are available here. The old documentation can be found here.

npm install jsonwebtoken @foal/jwt

JSON Web Token (JWT) is an open standard (RFC 7519) that defines a compact and self-contained way for securely transmitting information between parties as a JSON object. This information can be verified and trusted because it is digitally signed. JWTs can be signed using a secret (with the HMAC algorithm) or a public/private key pair using RSA or ECDSA.
Source: https://jwt.io/introduction/

Foal offers a package, named @foal/jwt, to manage authentication / authorization with JSON Web Tokens. When the user logs in, a token is generated and sent to the client. Then, each subsequent request must include this JWT, allowing the user to access routes, services, and resources that are permitted with that token.

Generate & Provide a Secret#

In order to use JWTs, you must provide a secret to sign your tokens. If you do not already have your own, you can generate one with the foal createsecret command.

$ foal createsecret
Ak0WcVcGuOoFuZ4oqF1tgqbW6dIAeSacIN6h7qEyJM8=

Alternatively you can use a public/private key pair to sign your tokens. In this case, please refer to the advanced section below.

Once the secret is in hand, there are several ways to provide it to the future hooks:

YAML
JSON
JS

settings:
  jwt:
    secret: "Ak0WcVcGuOoFuZ4oqF1tgqbW6dIAeSacIN6h7qEyJM8="
    secretEncoding: base64

Generate & Send Temporary Tokens#

JSON Web Tokens are generated from JavaScript objects that usually contain information about the user.

The below example shows how to generate a one-hour token using a secret.

import { getSecretOrPrivateKey } from '@foal/jwt';
import { sign } from 'jsonwebtoken';

const token = sign(
  {
    sub: '90485234',
    id: 90485234,
    email: 'mary@foalts.org'
  },
  getSecretOrPrivateKey(),
  { expiresIn: '1h' }
);

The getSecretOrPrivateKey function tries to read the configurations settings.jwt.secret and settings.jwt.privateKey. It throws an error if not value is provided. The function getSecretOrPublicKey works similarly.

The subject property (or sub) is only required when making a database call to get more user properties.
Each token should have an expiration time. Otherwise, the JWT will be valid indefinitely, which will raise security issues.

Example of a `LoginController`#

The below example shows how to implement a login controller with an email and a password.

login.controller.ts

import {
  Config, Context, HttpResponseOK, HttpResponseUnauthorized,
  Post, ValidateBody, verifyPassword
} from '@foal/core';
import { getSecretOrPrivateKey } from '@foal/jwt';
import { sign } from 'jsonwebtoken';

import { User } from '../entities';

export class LoginController {

  @Post('/login')
  @ValidateBody({
    additionalProperties: false,
    properties: {
      email: { type: 'string', format: 'email' },
      password: { type: 'string' }
    },
    required: [ 'email', 'password' ],
    type: 'object',
  })
  async login(ctx: Context) {
    const user = await User.findOne({ email: ctx.request.body.email });

    if (!user) {
      return new HttpResponseUnauthorized();
    }

    if (!await verifyPassword(ctx.request.body.password, user.password)) {
      return new HttpResponseUnauthorized();
    }

    const token = sign(
      { email: user.email },
      getSecretOrPrivateKey(),
      { expiresIn: '1h' }
    );

    return new HttpResponseOK({ token });
  }

}

user.entity.ts

import { hashPassword } from '@foal/core';
import { BaseEntity, Column, Entity, PrimaryGeneratedColumn } from 'typeorm';

@Entity()
export class User extends BaseEntity {

  @PrimaryGeneratedColumn()
  id: number;

  @Column({ unique: true })
  email: string;

  @Column()
  password: string;

  async setPassword(password: string) {
    this.password = await hashPassword(password);
  }

}

Receive & Verify Tokens#

Foal provides two hooks to authenticate users upon subsequent requests: JWTOptional and JWTRequired. They both expect the client to send the JWT in the Authorization header using the Bearer schema.

In other words, the content of the header should look like the following:

Authorization: Bearer <token>

If no token is provided, the JWTRequired hook returns an error 400 - BAD REQUEST while JWTOptional does nothing.

If a token is provided and valid, the hooks set the Context.user with the decoded payload (default behavior).

Example

import { Context, Get, HttpResponseOK } from '@foal/core';
import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

@JWTRequired()
export class ApiController {

  @Get('/products')
  readProducts(ctx: Context) {
    console.log(ctx.user);
    return new HttpResponseOK([]);
  }

}

Advanced#

Blacklist Tokens#

In the event that a jwt has been stolen by an attacker, the application must be able to revoke the compromised token. This can be done by establishing a black list. Revoked tokens are no longer considered valid and the hooks return a 401 error - UNAUTHORIZED when they receive one.

import { isInFile } from '@foal/core';
import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

@JWTRequired({ blackList: isInFile('./blacklist.txt') })
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

The isInFile function takes a token and returns a boolean specifying if the token is revoked or not.

You can provide your own function (in the case you want to use a cache database for example). This function must have this signature:

(token: string) => boolean|Promise<boolean>;

Refresh the tokens#

Having a too-long expiration date for JSON Web Tokens is not recommend as it increases exposure to attacks based on token hijacking. If an attacker succeeds in stealing a token with an insufficient expiration date, he/she will have plenty of time to make other attacks and harm your application.

In order to minimize the exposure, it is recommend to set a short expiration date (15 minutes for common applications) to quickly invalidate tokens. In this way, even if a token is stolen, it will quickly become unusable since it will have expired.

One of the disadvantages of having short expiration dates, however, is that users get logged out too often which is not very user-friendly.

One way to get around this problem is to generate and send a new token on each request. The client then saves this new token and uses it on further requests. In this way, if users are inactive more than 15 minutes, they are disconnected. Otherwise, the user will still be connected but the application will use a different token.

The below code shows how to implement this technique with a hook. On each request, the client will receive a new token in the Authorization header of the response. Other implementations are still possible (especially if you use cookies).

Note that when a new token is generated, the previous one is still valid until its expiration date.

refresh-jwt.hook.ts (example)

import { Hook, HookDecorator, HttpResponse, isHttpResponseServerError } from '@foal/core';
import { getSecretOrPrivateKey } from '@foal/jwt';
import { sign } from 'jsonwebtoken';

export function RefreshJWT(): HookDecorator {
  return Hook(ctx => {
    if (!ctx.user) {
      return;
    }

    return (response: HttpResponse) => {
      if (isHttpResponseServerError(response)) {
        return;
      }

      const newToken = sign(
        // The below object assumes that ctx.user is
        // the decoded payload (default behavior).
        {
          email: ctx.user.email,
          // id: ctx.user.id,
          // sub: ctx.user.subject,
        },
        getSecretOrPrivateKey(),
        { expiresIn: '15m' }
      );
      response.setHeader('Authorization', newToken);
    };

  });
}

api.controller.ts (example)

@JWTRequired()
@RefreshJWT()
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

Make a Database Call to Get More User Properties#

In several cases, the decoded payload is not sufficient. We may need to fetch extra properties from the database, such as the user permissions for example, or simply want the Context.user to a be a model instance instead of a plain object.

In these cases, the two hooks JWTRequired and JWTOptional offer a user option to transform the decoded payload into something else. To do this,

Each JSON Web Token must have a subject property (or sub) which is a string containing the user id. If the id is a number, it must be converted to a string using, for example, the toString() method.
import { getSecretOrPrivateKey } from '@foal/jwt';
import { sign } from 'jsonwebtoken';

const token = sign(
{
// TypeScript v3.5.1 and v3.5.2 have a bug which makes the compilation fail
// with the property "sub". This can be fixed by adding "as any" after the object.
sub: '90485234', // Required
id: 90485234,
email: 'mary@foalts.org'
},
getSecretOrPrivateKey(),
{ expiresIn: '1h' }
);
The hook must be provided a function that takes a string id (the subject) as parameter and returns the value of the Context.user. If the function returns undefined, the hooks returns an error 401 - UNAUTHORIZED.
Example with TypeORM (SQL database)
import { Context, Get } from '@foal/core';
import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';
import { fetchUser } from '@foal/typeorm';

import { User } from '../entities';

// fetchUser fetches the user from the database using the entity User. It returns an instance of User.
@JWTRequired({ user: fetchUser(User) })
export class ApiController {
@Get('/do-something')
get(ctx: Context) {
// ctx.user is the instance returned by fetchUser.
// ...
}
}
Example with TypeORM (MongoDB)
import { Context, Get } from '@foal/core';
import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';
import { fetchMongoDBUser } from '@foal/typeorm';

import { User } from '../entities';

// fetchMongoDBUser fetches the user from the database using the entity User. It returns an instance of User.
@JWTRequired({ user: fetchMongoDBUser(User) })
export class ApiController {
@Get('/do-something')
get(ctx: Context) {
// ctx.user is the instance returned by fetchMongoDBUser.
// ...
}
}
Example with a custom function
import { Context, Get } from '@foal/core';
import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

const users = [
{ id: 1, email: 'mary@foalts.org', isAdmin: true },
{ id: 2, email: 'john@foalts.org', isAdmin: false },
];

function getUserById(id: string) {
return users.find(user => user.id.toString() === id);
}

@JWTRequired({ user: getUserById })
export class ApiController {
@Get('/do-something')
get(ctx: Context) {
// ctx.user is an item of the `users` array.
// ...
}
}

Specifying a Different Encoding for Secrets#

By default, UTF-8 is used to encode the secret string into bytes when verifying the token. However, you can use another character encoding with the settings.jwt.secretEncoding configuration key.

Available encodings are listed here.

YAML
JSON
JS

settings:
  jwt:
    secret: HEwh0TW7w6a5yUwIrpHilUqetAqTFAVSHx2rg6DWNtg=
    secretEncoding: base64

Usage with Cookies#

Be aware that if you use cookies, your application must provide a CSRF defense.

By default, the hooks expect the token to be sent in the Authorization header using the Bearer schema. But it is also possible to send the token in a cookie with the cookie option.

api.controller.ts

import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

@JWTRequired({ cookie: true })
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

auth.controller.ts

export class AuthController {

  @Post('/login')
  async login(ctx: Context) {
    // ...

    const response = new HttpResponseNoContent();
    // Do not forget the "await" keyword.
    await setAuthCookie(response, token);
    return response;
  }

  @Post('/logout')
  logout(ctx: Context) {
    // ...

    const response = new HttpResponseNoContent();
    removeAuthCookie(response);
    return response;
  }

}

Note: the cookie expire date is equal to the JWT expire date.

Cookie options#

YAML
JSON
JS

settings:
  jwt:
    cookie:
      name: mycookiename # Default: auth
      domain: example.com
      httpOnly: true # Warning: unlike session tokens, the httpOnly directive has no default value.
      path: /foo # Default: /
      sameSite: strict # Default: lax if settings.jwt.csrf.enabled is true.
      secure: true

Use RSA or ECDSA public/private keys#

JWTs can also be signed using a public/private key pair using RSA or ECDSA.

Provide the Public and Private Keys#

First of all, specify in the configuration where the keys are stored.

config/default.js

const { Env } = require('@foal/core');
const { readFileSync } = require('fs');

module.exports = {
  settings: {
    jwt: {
      privateKey: Env.get('RSA_PRIVATE_KEY') || readFileSync('./id_rsa', 'utf8'),
      publicKey: Env.get('RSA_PUBLIC_KEY') || readFileSync('./id_rsa.pub', 'utf8'),
    }
  }
}

Then you can provide the keys in RSA files (id_rsa and .id_rsa/pub) or in environment variables.

Generate Temporary Tokens#

Example

import { Config } from '@foal/core';
import { getSecretOrPrivateKey } from '@foal/jwt';
import { sign } from 'jsonwebtoken';

const token = sign(
  {
    email: 'john@foalts.org'
  },
  getSecretOrPrivateKey(),
  { expiresIn: '1h', algorithm: 'RS256' }
);

Receive & Verify Tokens#

Example with RSA

import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

@JWTRequired({}, { algorithm: 'RS256' })
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

Audience, Issuer and Other Options#

The second parameter of JWTOptional and JWTRequired allows to specify the required audience or issuer as well as other properties. It is passed as options to the verify function of the jsonwebtoken library.

Example checking the audience

import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

@JWTRequired({}, { audience: [ /urn:f[o]{2}/, 'urn:bar' ] })
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

Example checking the issuer

import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

@JWTRequired({}, { issuer: 'foo' })
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

Retreive a Dynamic Secret Or Public Key#

By default JWTRequired and JWTOptional use the value of the configuration keys settings.jwt.secret or settings.jwt.publicKey as a static secret (or public key).

But it is also possible to dynamically retrieve a key to verify the token. To do so, you can specify a function with the below signature to the secretOrPublicKey option.

(header: any, payload: any) => Promise<string>;

Example

import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

@JWTRequired({
  secretOrPublicKey: async (header, payload) => {
    // ...
    return 'my-secret';
  }
})
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

If needed, this function can throw an InvalidTokenError to return a 401 error to the client.

Example

import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

@JWTRequired({
  secretOrPublicKey: async (header, payload) => {
    if (header.alg !== 'RS256') {
      throw new InvalidTokenError('invalid algorithm');
    }
    return 'my-secret';
  }
})
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

In the above example, if the algorithm specified in the token is not RS256, then the server will respond a 401 - UNAUTHORIZED error with this content:

{
  code: 'invalid_token',
  description: 'invalid algorithm'
}

Retreive a Public Key from a JWKS endpoint#

npm install @foal/jwks-rsa

The getRSAPublicKeyFromJWKS allows you to retreive a public key from a JWKS endpoint. It is based on the jwks-rsa library.

Example

import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

@JWTRequired({
  secretOrPublicKey: getRSAPublicKeyFromJWKS({
    cache: true,
    cacheMaxEntries: 5, // Default value
    cacheMaxAge: ms('10h'), // Default value
    jwksUri: 'http://localhost:3000/.well-known/jwks.json',
  })
})
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

Auth0 and AWS Cognito (examples)#

npm install @foal/jwks-rsa

Auth0 & AWS Cognito are both platforms to manage authentication & authorization.

This section provides examples on how to decode and verify JWTs generated by these platforms (the id_token). It assumes that you are already familiar with them.

Auth0

import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

// These lines assume that you provided your DOMAIN and AUDIENCE in either
// an .env file, in environment variables or in one the configuration file 
// in `config/`.
const domain = Config.getOrThrow('auth0.domain', 'string');
const audience = Config.getOrThrow('auth0.audience', 'string');

@JWTRequired({
  secretOrPublicKey: getRSAPublicKeyFromJWKS({
    cache: true,
    jwksRequestsPerMinute: 5,
    jwksUri: `https://${domain}/.well-known/jwks.json`,
    rateLimit: true,
  })
}, {
  algorithms: [ 'RS256' ],
  audience,
  issuer: `https://${domain}/`,
})
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

AWS Cognito

import { JWTRequired } from '@foal/jwt';

// These lines assume that you provided your CLIENT_ID, DOMAIN and USER_POOL_ID
// in either an .env file, in environment variables or in one the configuration 
// file in `config/`.
const clientId = Config.getOrThrow('cognito.clientId', 'string');
const domain = Config.getOrThrow('cognito.domain', 'string');
const userPoolId = Config.getOrThrow('cognito.userPoolId', 'string');

@JWTRequired({
  secretOrPublicKey: getRSAPublicKeyFromJWKS({
    cache: true,
    jwksRequestsPerMinute: 5,
    jwksUri: `https://cognito-idp.${region}.amazonaws.com/${userPoolId}/.well-known/jwks.json`,
    rateLimit: true,
  })
}, {
  algorithms: [ 'RS256' ],
  audience: clientId,
  issuer: `https://cognito-idp.${region}.amazonaws.com/${userPoolId}`,
})
export class ApiController {
  // ...
}

Note: The above example does not use a secret for simplicity.

Hook Errors#

Error	Response Status	Response Body	`WWW-Authenticate` Response Header
No secret or public key is provided in `default.json` or as environment variable.	500
The `Authorization` header does not exist (only for `JWTRequired`).	400	`{ code: 'invalid_request', description: 'Authorization header not found.' }`
The auth cookie does not exist (only for `JWTRequired`).	400	`{ code: 'invalid_request', description: 'Auth cookie not found.' }`
The `Authorization` header does use the Bearer scheme.	400	`{ code: 'invalid_request', description: 'Expected a bearer token. Scheme is Authorization: Bearer <token>.' }`
The token is black listed.	401	`{ code: 'invalid_token', description: 'jwt revoked' }`	error="invalid_token", error_description="jwt revoked"
The token is not a JWT.	401	`{ code: 'invalid_token', description: 'jwt malformed' }`	error="invalid_token", error_description="jwt malformed"
The signature is invalid.	401	`{ code: 'invalid_token', description: 'jwt signature' }`	error="invalid_token", error_description="jwt signature"
The token is expired.	401	`{ code: 'invalid_token', description: 'jwt expired' }`	error="invalid_token", error_description="jwt expired"
The audience is not expected.	401	`{ code: 'invalid_token', description: 'jwt audience invalid. expected: xxx' }`	error="invalid_token", error_description="jwt audience invalid. expected: xxx"
The issuer is not expected.	401	`{ code: 'invalid_token', description: 'jwt issuer invalid. expected: xxx' }`	error="invalid_token", error_description="jwt issuer invalid. expected: xxx"
There is no subject claim and `options.user` is defined.	401	`{ code: 'invalid_token', description: 'The token must include a subject which is the id of the user.' }`	error="invalid_token", error_description="The token must include a subject which is the id of the user."
`options.user` is defined and no user was found from its value (function).	401	`{ code: 'invalid_token', description: 'The token subject does not match any user.' }`	error="invalid_token", error_description="The token subject does not match any user."

Generate & Provide a Secret#

Generate & Send Temporary Tokens#

Example of a LoginController#

Receive & Verify Tokens#

Advanced#

Blacklist Tokens#

Refresh the tokens#

Make a Database Call to Get More User Properties#

Specifying a Different Encoding for Secrets#

Usage with Cookies#

Cookie options#

Use RSA or ECDSA public/private keys#

Provide the Public and Private Keys#

Generate Temporary Tokens#

Receive & Verify Tokens#

Audience, Issuer and Other Options#

Retreive a Dynamic Secret Or Public Key#

Retreive a Public Key from a JWKS endpoint#

Auth0 and AWS Cognito (examples)#

Hook Errors#

Example of a `LoginController`#