Spot vulnerabilities in PostgreSQL extension scripts.
pgspot checks extension scripts for following PostgreSQL security best practices. In addition to checking extension scripts it can also be used to check security definer functions or any other PostgreSQL SQL code.
pgspot checks for the following vulnerabilities:
- search_path-based attacks
- unsafe object creation
Consult the reference for detailed documentation of the vulnerabilities which pgspot detects, and their potential mitigations.
- PostgreSQL security recommendations for extensions
- PostgreSQL security recommendations for SECURITY DEFINER functions
pip install pgspot
- python >= 3.10
- pglast
- libpg_query (through pglast)
To install the runtime requirements, use pip install -r requirements.txt.
> pgspot -h
usage: pgspot [-h] [-a] [--proc-without-search-path PROC] [--summary-only] [--plpgsql | --no-plpgsql] [--explain EXPLAIN] [--ignore IGNORE] [--sql-accepting SQL_FN] [FILE ...]
Spot vulnerabilities in PostgreSQL SQL scripts
positional arguments:
FILE file to check for vulnerabilities
options:
-h, --help show this help message and exit
-a, --append append files before checking
--proc-without-search-path PROC
whitelist functions without explicit search_path
--summary-only only print number of errors, warnings and unknowns
--plpgsql, --no-plpgsql
Analyze PLpgSQL code (default: True)
--explain EXPLAIN Describe an error/warning code
--ignore IGNORE Ignore error or warning code
--ignore-lang LANG Ignore unknown procedural language
--sql-accepting SQL_FN
Specify one or more sql-accepting functions
> pgspot --ignore PS017 <<<"CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS foo();"
PS012: Unsafe table creation: foo
Errors: 1 Warnings: 0 Unknown: 0
It is a common pattern that SQL-accepting functions exist, which take a
string-like argument which will be executed as SQL. This can "hide" some SQL
from pgspot, as the string-like argument masks the SQL. With the
--sql-accepting argument, pgspot can be told about such functions.
Assuming a function named execute_sql which takes a SQL string as its first
argument, and executes it. With pgspot --sql-accepting=execute_sql we can
tell pgspot execute_sql may accept SQL. pgspot will attempt to unpack and
evaluate all arguments to that function as SQL.