Error accessing authenticated endpoint with plain HTTP endpoint [HTTPError: Only https is supported]

[thelazydogsback]

What are you generating using Kiota, clients or plugins?

API Client/SDK

In what context or format are you using Kiota?

Windows executable

Client library/SDK language

Python

Describe the bug

I am trying to access an authenticated HTTP endpoint - not HTTPS.
However it appears that authentication must take place over HTTPS.

Expected behavior

Both the authentication call and the final api call should succeed

How to reproduce

The following code using only httpx works fine when the baseUri is "http://mySvc".
Note this is an authenticated service-to-service call within a single Azure Container vnet - only an HTTP endpoint is exposed, not HTTPS.

def get_my_foo(baseUri, id):
    scope = "api://xxxxx/.default"
    credential = ChainedTokenCredential(ManagedIdentityCredential(), DefaultAzureCredential())
    token = credential.get_token(scope).token
    with httpx.Client() as client: 
        headers = { "Authorization": f"Bearer {token}" }
        response = client.get(f"{baseUri}/foos/{id}", headers=headers)
        response.raise_for_status()  # This will raise an exception for 4xx/5xx errors
        return response.json()

However, using this kiota generated client:

        credential = ChainedTokenCredential(ManagedIdentityCredential(), DefaultAzureCredential()  )
        # Note that no combination of these params makes any difference here
        http_client = httpx.AsyncClient(verify = False,  follow_redirects = True)
        auth_provider = AzureIdentityAuthenticationProvider(credential, scopes=adt_api_scope) 
        request_adapter = HttpxRequestAdapter(
            http_client = http_client,
            authentication_provider = auth_provider,
            base_url = self.base_url)
        client = MyClientKiota(request_adapter)

Does not work when calling client.foos.by_id(id). The error I get is:

 File "/usr/local/lib/python3.12/site-packages/kiota_authentication_azure/azure_identity_access_token_provider.py", line 78, in get_authorization_token
    raise exc
kiota_authentication_azure._exceptions.HTTPError: Only https is supported

This appears to be because that while my actual internal service call needs to be plain HTTP, then auth call needs to be HTTPS.
How do I get the kiota client to behave like the httx code, (apparently) still using HTTPS to get the token, but using HTTP to access my endpoint?

Open API description file

No response

Kiota Version

1.17.0+1eb16cd65853c17179e2dde3ae6098135deacf55

Latest Kiota version known to work for scenario above?(Not required)

No response

Known Workarounds

No response

Configuration

No response

Debug output

Click to expand log

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</details>


### Other information

_No response_

[baywet]

Hi @thelazydogsback ,
Thank you for using Kiota and for reaching out.
This is a design principle to avoid compromising credentials.
Transmitting jwts over clear HTTP makes the application extremely vulnerable to a monster in the middle attack.
While this vulnerability is negated in loopback scenarios, we don't want to give people an easy way out so they don't accidentally build unsecure applications.

Your best way forward is probably to create a new "DangerousAzureIdentityAcccesTokenProvider" that derives from the original one, replaces http by https, and calls the base method.
Then you can also create a "DangerousAzureIdentityAuthenticationProvider" by copying the code we have in the original one but changing the access token provider by the one you've just provided.

Let us know if you have additional questions.

[SilverioMiranda]

@baywet i think that approach a pain in the ass, i use kiota for in cluster communications inside k8s using bff architecture, so there is no security problem, there is no access to external urls, i realy think that must be a better way around that, an easy one

[baywet]

Thank you for the additional information.

On the technical side, the change "is easy". Simply add another setting the the authentication/access token providers to drive the condition which enforces the use of HTTPS.

What I'm questioning is whether we should make it easy, at the risk of making it easy to build unsecured applications and compromising customers.

Maybe if we named the setting "DangerousDisableHttpsVerification" or something along those lines it make this distinction clear?
We could also add an open telemetry tracing attribute when this is disabled, or trigger an event (the later option being much noisier).

I'd like to get the input of our architect @darrelmiller before we more forward with this one.

[thelazydogsback]

Thanks @SilverioMiranda and @baywet.
Yes with the vnet setup the container ecosystem is closed to the outside world (except for public BFF containers where ispublic=true) and there should be no security issue. (Not "loopback" to single host but set of containers with local DNS resolving internal services.)
I don't see this as being uncommon these days, so ISTM that a "best practice" that only addresses a particular scenario could be the default but should be changeable via a setting as you suggest.
(I could be wrong, but ISTM that the onus of deciding what is a secure application is the responsibility of the target service design/author, and not the consumer/client - but I guess defense in depth is best...)

[thelazydogsback]

Thanks @baywet - I was able to implement your suggestion by overriding AzureIdentityAcccesTokenProvider which has a copy/paste implementation of get_authorization_token with this code disabled:

                if parsed_url.scheme != "https" and (parsed_url.hostname not in self.LOCALHOST_STRINGS):
                    span.set_attribute(self.IS_VALID_URL, False)
                    exc = HTTPError("Only https is supported")
                    span.record_exception(exc)
                    raise exe

and providing a subclass of BaseBearerTokenAuthenticationProvider to provide it.

So I'm good for now, but will remove this code if there is a configurable option in the future.

[baywet]

Thank you for the additional information.

An alternative (and arguably better) design here would be to make the localhost_strings configurable with a better name like "HostsToAllowHttp" or something like that. It could reuse the entirety of the ValidHosts infrastructure, leading to minimal duplication in the implementation.

But again, I'll like a sign off from @darrelmiller before we proceed here.

[darrelmiller]

There is ongoing discussion in the IETF about sending credentials to APIs over HTTP(S) https://www.ietf.org/archive/id/draft-rsalz-httpapi-privacy-00.html following the blog post a few months ago about the risks of redirecting HTTP to HTTPS.

Some people are of the opinion that APIs should only be exposed via HTTPs. richsalz/draft-rsalz-httpapi-privacy#7

I don't have a strong objection to making it possible to turn off HTTPS as long as it is clear that it is not a recommended approach.

[thelazydogsback]

Thanks @darrelmiller . That makes sense to me for APIs exposed to the outside world, but I'm not sure I see the reasoning if none of the endpoints are even reachable at all except from other internal services that are in the same vnet, and also check that the caller is whitelisted, etc. HTTPS is pretty fast, but it's not free. (A few hundred ms for handshakes and 10-20% overhead thereafter?)

[baywet]

Thanks for chiming in.

On the spirit of the ask: while there's probably no risk for a loopback scenario, there's probably still some risk on a microservices scenario, even running on a single host. All those containers are relying on IPs, names, and DNS to communicate with each other. A compromised container could in theory start sending new IPs, change the DNS resolution and start observing clear HTTP traffic. Hopefully the network stack for the container engine guards against that through firewalls preventing containers from doing DHCP, but that's not a guarantee. So yes, it should be clearly called out.

But let's experiment with what it'd mean to open this up a little more. @SilverioMiranda @thelazydogsback would one of you be willing to submit a draft PR with:

1. an additional optional parameter "dangerous_allow_http_hosts" in the authentication provider (pass it down to the access token provider, initialize with this value)
2. a reflection of that optional parameter in the azure identity access token provider
3. initialize a new allowed host provider with the value
4. use the new allowed host provider property for the validation

[microsoft-github-policy-service]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale because it has been marked as requiring author feedback but has not had any activity for 4 days. It will be closed if no further activity occurs within 3 days of this comment.