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Security: vectordotdev/vector

SECURITY.md

Security Policy


Reporting a vulnerability? See the Vulnerability Reporting section


We understand that many users place a high level of trust in Vector to collect and ship mission-critical data. The security of Vector is a top priority. That's why we apply widely accepted best practices when it comes to security. This document will describe these practices and aims to be as transparent as possible on our security efforts.

Project Structure

Project structure plays an important role in security. It creates guardrails that prevent common security issues. This section will outline our deliberate structural decisions that impact security.

Transparency

We believe transparency is a strong deterrent of nefarious behavior that could otherwise undermine security.

Open Source

Vector and its dependencies are open-source. All code and changes are publicly available at our GitHub repo. While the transparent nature open source helps to improve security, so does the large collaborative community behind Vector.

Workflow

All of Vector's workflow is transparent. Pull requests, issues, chats, and our roadmap are all publicly available.

Version Control

Version control ensures that all code changes are audited and authentic.

Git

Vector leverages the Git version-control system. This ensures all changes are audited and traceable.

Signed Commits

Because of Vector's merge style, commits to release branches are signed by GitHub itself during the squash and merge process. Commits to development branches are encouraged to be signed but not required since changes must go through a review process.

Protected Branches

Vector cuts releases from the master and v* branches only. These branches are protected. The exact requirements are:

  • Cannot be deleted.
  • Force pushes are not allowed.
  • A linear history is required.
  • Signed commits are required.
  • Administrators are included in these checks.

Personnel

Education

Vector team members are required to review this security document as well as the contributing and reviewing documents.

Policies

Vector maintains this security policy. Changed are communicated to all Vector team members.

Two-factor Authentication

All Vector team members are required to enable two-factor authentication for their GitHub accounts.

Privilege Model

Vector follows the principle of least privilege for its personnel access model. Vector maintains tiers user groups with tiered privileges to ensure users only have access to the minimal resources necessary.

Third-Parties

When used, third-parties must also adhere to this security policy. Access is based on the principle of least privilege and removed when the contract ends.

Development & Code

Design & Architecture

The base of Vector's security lies in our choice of underlying technology and decisions around design and architecture.

Rust

The Rust programming language is memory and thread-safe; it will catch many common sources of vulnerabilities at compile time.

Unsafe Code

Vector does not allow the use of unsafe code except in circumstances where it is required, such as dealing with CFFI.

User Privileges

Vector is always designed to run under non-root privileges, and our documentation always defaults to non-root use.

Dependencies

Vector aims to reduce the number of dependencies it relies on. If a dependency is added it goes through a comprehensive review process that is detailed in the Reviewing guide.

Change Control

As noted above Vector uses the Git version control system on GitHub.

Pull Requests

All changes to Vector must go through a pull request review process.

Reviews & Approvals

All pull requests must be reviewed by at least one Vector team member. The review process takes into account many factors, all of which are detailed in our Reviewing guide. In exceptional circumstances, this approval can be retroactive.

Merge Policies

Vector requires pull requests to pass all automated checks. Once passed, the pull request must be squashed and merged. This creates a clean linear history with a Vector team member's co-sign.

Automated Checks

When possible, we'll create automated checks to enforce security policies.

Vulnerability Scans & Security Advisories

Vulnerability Remediation

If the advisory check fails then the PR will not be merged. We review each advisory to determine what action to take. If possible, we update the dependency to a version where the vulnerability has been addressed. If this isn't possible we either record the acceptance of the vulnerability or replace the dependency. If we accept the vulnerability we open a ticket to track its remediation, generally awaiting a fix upstream. If the risk is deemed unacceptable we revisit the code and dependency to find a more secure alternative.

Fuzz Testing

Vector implements automated fuzz testing to probe our code for other sources of potential vulnerabilities.

Infrastructure

Because Vector is an open-source project designed to be self-hosted it uses minimal infrastructure. Below we cover the various responsibilities for Vector's infrastructure and how we secure them.

CI/CD

Runtime Isolation

All builds run in an isolated sandbox that is destroyed after each use.

Network Security

Penetration Testing

Vector performs quarterly pen tests on vector.dev.

Protocols

All network traffic is secured via TLS and SSH. This includes checking out Vector's code from the relevant protected branch, Docker image retrieval, and publishing of Vector's release artifacts.

Release Artifacts & Channels

Asset Audit Logging

Changes to Vector's assets are logged through S3's audit logging feature.

Asset Signatures & Checksums

All assets are signed with checksums allowing users to verify asset authenticity upon download. This verifies that assets have not been modified at rest.

Meta

Review Schedule

Vector reviews this policy and all user access levels on a quarterly basis.

Vulnerability Reporting

We deeply appreciate any effort to discover and disclose security vulnerabilities responsibly.

If you would like to report a vulnerability or have any security concerns with Vector, please e-mail [email protected].

For non-critical matters, we prefer users open an issue. For us to best investigate your request, please include any of the following when reporting:

  • Proof of concept
  • Any tools, including versions used
  • Any relevant output

We take all disclosures very seriously and will do our best to rapidly respond and verify the vulnerability before taking the necessary steps to fix it. After our initial reply to your disclosure, which should be directly after receiving it, we will periodically update you with the status of the fix.

There aren’t any published security advisories