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Authentication

The /api/v1/* surface is protected by a single pluggable middleware. Operators configure it via the auth: block in workbench.yaml; route handlers read the result from the Hono context.

This doc covers the contract, the threat model, the config, and the rollout plan. Current status: Phase 3c — OIDC browser login + silent refresh live. Workspace-scoped wb_live_* tokens (mode: apiKey) and JWT bearer tokens from an OIDC issuer (mode: oidc) are both accepted; mode: any registers both so either shape authenticates. When auth.oidc.client is configured the runtime also hosts an OIDC authorization-code-with-PKCE login flow for the web UI — no paste-a-token required. The default is still disabled so existing workflows keep working.

Default posture

If you ship nothing new, nothing changes:

auth:
  mode: disabled
  anonymousPolicy: allow

That's the default. The middleware runs, tags every request anonymous, and routes behave as before. The runtime is still meant to sit behind an external auth boundary (reverse proxy / API gateway) in this mode.

Configuration

auth:
  # disabled | apiKey | oidc | any
  mode: disabled

  # How to handle requests that arrive without an `Authorization`
  # header.
  #   - allow  : treat as anonymous, let the request through
  #   - reject : respond 401 immediately
  #
  # In `disabled` mode there's nothing to verify against, so
  # `reject` is the only way to force authentication at this phase
  # (useful for CI smoke tests to confirm the middleware is wired).
  anonymousPolicy: allow

  # Required when mode is `oidc` or `any`. The runtime fetches the
  # issuer's JWKS at startup (via OIDC discovery if jwksUri is null)
  # and verifies every JWT's signature, issuer, audience, exp, and
  # nbf before trusting it.
  oidc:
    issuer: https://idp.example.com
    audience: ai-workbench          # or [a, b, c]
    # jwksUri: null                  # auto-discover from issuer
    # clockToleranceSeconds: 30
    # claims:
    #   subject: sub                 # → AuthSubject.id
    #   label: email                 # → AuthSubject.label
    #   workspaceScopes: wb_workspace_scopes  # array claim → scopes

Contract

Every /api/v1/* request goes through the middleware, which writes an AuthContext onto the Hono context:

interface AuthContext {
  mode: "disabled" | "apiKey" | "oidc" | "any";
  authenticated: boolean;      // true when a verifier matched
  anonymous: boolean;          // true when no token was presented and policy allowed it
  subject: AuthSubject | null; // the verified principal, if any
}

Route handlers read it via c.get("auth"). Workspace-scoped authorization is enforced by an app-level wrapper around /api/v1/workspaces/{workspaceId}/... routes — an authenticated subject whose workspaceScopes does not include the target workspace gets 403 forbidden. Anonymous and unscoped subjects pass through (unchanged behavior); GET /workspaces additionally filters its response to the subject's scopes so scoped callers see only workspaces they can reach. Per-route role checks (RBAC) land in a later phase.

Authorization model

Subject Can reach
anonymous (anonymousPolicy: allow) all workspaces, unchanged
authenticated, workspaceScopes: null all workspaces + platform-level operations (unscoped — operator/admin tokens will land here in Phase 4)
authenticated, workspaceScopes: [...] only workspaces whose uid appears in the list; cannot create new workspaces

A workspace-scoped API key (the only kind the Phase 2 UI issues) carries exactly the workspace that produced it, so a key minted in workspace A is a 403 on every route under workspace B.

Platform-level operations. Creating a new workspace (POST /api/v1/workspaces) isn't tied to any existing workspace, so assertWorkspaceAccess can't gate it. A second helper, assertPlatformAccess, refuses the request when the subject has a non-null scope list — otherwise a workspace-scoped key could silently escalate by minting a fresh tenant outside its scope and operating against it. Anonymous callers and unscoped subjects (operator tokens) pass through.

Privilege scopes (coarse tiers + fine grants)

Workspace API keys carry a second axis besides workspace membership: a privilege-scope list. 0.5.0 refines the three coarse tiers into a fine-grained taxonomy while keeping the coarse tiers as first-class supersets, so existing keys are unaffected.

Coarse tiers (aligned with the RBAC roles in auth/roles.ts — viewer / editor / admin):

  • read — list / fetch / search workspace content.
  • write — mutate workspace content (KBs, documents, agents, services, ingest).
  • manage — admin-only operations: API keys, RLAC principals + policy, and workspace destroy.

Fine grants (0.5.0) let an operator mint a narrowly-scoped key:

Coarse tier Fine grants Each fine grant covers
read read:content · read:chat · read:audit KB search + document/chunk reads · conversation history · policy-audit log
write write:ingest · write:kb · write:services · write:agents ingest + document/record CRUD · KB + knowledge-filter CRUD · execution services + MCP servers · agent CRUD
manage manage:keys · manage:access · manage:workspace mint / revoke API keys · RLAC principals + policy · workspace destroy
(standalone) tools:invoke drive an agent to call external (remote-MCP) tools

Containment is the whole design. A held scope grants a required scope when they're equal, or when the held scope is a coarse tier of the required fine grant — matched on the : boundary, so write grants write:ingest but not a sibling like writeX (subjectGrantsScope in auth/roles.ts; assertScope / requireScope in auth/authz.ts apply it). Consequences:

  • A legacy ["read", "write"] key still satisfies every write:* route — no key minted before 0.5.0 loses access.
  • A narrow ["read", "write:ingest"] key can ingest but cannot create a KB (write:kb), administer access (manage:access), or mint keys (manage:keys).
  • A fine grant never widens upward: write:ingest grants neither coarse write nor a sibling write:kb.

Keys minted before scopes existed back-compat to ["read", "write"]; OIDC and bootstrap subjects carry scopes: null, which implicitly grants every scope.

Enforcement resolves a fine scope per route and applies it through the same containment check, so coarse keys keep working:

  1. MCP tool gate — each write tool requires its fine scope (ingest_text / delete_document → write:ingest; create_knowledge_base / delete_knowledge_base → write:kb) and returns isError: true with outcome: "denied" for a caller that lacks it. See MCP per-tool scopes.
  2. REST mutation gate — mutatingRouteWriteScope() is mounted on every /api/v1/workspaces/{w}/* route, right after workspaceRouteAuthz. The middleware:
    • Lets GET / HEAD / OPTIONS through unconditionally — read methods can't mutate.
    • Lets a small allowlist of "POST-as-read" paths through: /test-connection, /connect/verify, /mcp (JSON-RPC entry point; tool-level scope check handles individual writes), /search (body-shaped query), and anything under /conversations (chat session state, mirroring the ungated chat_send MCP tool — conversations and their messages aren't KB content).
    • Maps every other write-shaped request (POST/PATCH/PUT/DELETE) to its fine scope via writeScopeForRoute(path) — ingest / documents / records → write:ingest; knowledge-bases + filters → write:kb; execution services + MCP servers → write:services; agents → write:agents; any unmatched mutating path falls back to coarse write (the strictly-most-restrictive floor, so a new route can't under-gate) — and skips the manage-scoped routes (gated below) so a narrow manage:* key isn't blocked by the write floor. A key lacking the resolved scope gets 403 forbidden with message: "authenticated subject is missing required scope 'write:ingest'" (or whichever fine scope applied).
  3. REST admin gate — manageRouteScope() maps admin surfaces to their fine scope via manageScopeForRoute(path): …/api-keys → manage:keys; …/principals and …/policy (the entire CRUD surface incl. the policy-audit log — listing credentials or principals is itself a privileged read) → manage:access; DELETE /workspaces/{w} → manage:workspace. A legacy ["read", "write", "manage"] key passes all of them by containment; an editor (["read", "write"]) key still gets 403 forbidden. (The rlacEnabled toggle on PATCH /workspaces/{w} requires manage:access in the handler — it shares a route with the write-level rename.)
  4. Agent external-tool gate — when an agent calls an external (remote-MCP) tool mid-conversation, the dispatcher checks subjectCanInvokeTools(c): a scoped key must hold tools:invoke or the coarse write tier (so legacy write keys and the default ["read","write"] keep working; a read-only or fine write:* key is denied). A denied call returns the same denied tool outcome as an allow-list miss — the model sees a "not permitted" string and the tool.invoke audit row carries reason: "missing tools:invoke scope" — so it composes with the SSE/tool-result contract rather than failing the request. Built-in / native / Astra tools are unaffected.

A 403 from a scope gate also carries a structured requiredScope field on its auth.api_denied audit row (e.g. write:ingest), so compliance can aggregate denials by scope — see audit.md.

Anonymous callers (when anonymousPolicy: allow) and scopes: null subjects bypass every gate — anonymousPolicy is the only knob that decides whether anonymous reaches the route at all, and unscoped subjects are the operator-key escape hatch.

The gates are mount-based rather than per-route, so a freshly added mutating route inherits a check automatically — and because writeScopeForRoute defaults unmatched mutating paths to coarse write, that inherited gate is never weaker than before; refine it to a fine scope once the route's facet is clear. New "POST-as-read" endpoints add a path suffix to the allowlist instead of editing every call site.

Migration (0.5.0). Fine scopes are fully additive — unlike the 0.4.0 manage split below, no existing key loses any capability. Every route maps under the same coarse tier it required in 0.4.x, so a legacy read / write / manage key grants the new fine scopes by containment. What's new is the ability to mint narrower keys (an ingest-only ["read", "write:ingest"] key, say — via the create-key dialog's "Custom (advanced)" picker or aiw key create --scope write:ingest) and to drive agents' external-tool calls under a dedicated tools:invoke grant. Deliberate notes: chat send stays ungated (the …/conversations routes remain in the read-shaped allowlist, so a read-only key can still chat); write:agents is reserved for agent CRUD, not chat. The policy-audit log stays admin-gated (manage:access); read:audit is defined in the taxonomy but not yet bound to a route.

Migration (0.4.0). Splitting manage out of write is a deliberate behavior change: an existing ["read", "write"] key that previously issued API keys, administered RLAC, or deleted a workspace now gets 403 forbidden on those routes. Re-mint the key with manage (or use an OIDC admin / bootstrap token) to restore the old capability. Content mutations (KBs, documents, agents, services, ingest) are unaffected — write still covers them.

OIDC role mapping (opt-in). By default OIDC subjects carry scopes: null (all scopes). Set auth.oidc.roleMapping to derive an RBAC role from a token claim and constrain those subjects:

auth:
  oidc:
    roleMapping:
      claim: groups          # token claim holding the role / group(s)
      values:                # claim value → role
        wb-admins: admin
        wb-editors: editor
      default: viewer        # role when the claim is absent / unmapped

The claim may be a single value or an array (groups); the highest-privileged match wins. A per-workspace principal record role still overrides the claim role for that workspace. With no roleMapping, OIDC behavior is unchanged (all scopes) — so this is a deliberate opt-in, not a silent restriction.

Surfacing role + scopes (UI / CLI gating)

GET /auth/me reports the caller's effective role and privilege scopes alongside the existing identity fields:

{
  "id": "carol",
  "label": "carol@ex.com",
  "type": "oidc",
  "workspaceScopes": ["..."],
  "role": "admin",
  "scopes": ["read", "write", "manage"],
  "expiresAt": 1777230000,
  "canRefresh": true
}

role and scopes are each null when no gate applies — an OIDC subject with no roleMapping carries every scope and reports { role: null, scopes: null }. An API-key subject reports its concrete scope array, labelled with the matching role when the set corresponds to a whole role (e.g. ["read"] → viewer). This is a pure projection for client gating; the authoritative gate is always the route-level requireScope / manageRouteScope enforcement above, never this field.

Consumers:

  • Web UI — the useRole() hook reads /auth/me and hides/disables admin-only affordances for non-admins: API-key management, the access-control (RLAC) toggle, principal + policy panels, and the workspace-delete button (all on the workspace settings page). Gating is permissive by default — when there is no role signal (login disabled, or an unscoped subject) the controls show, because the server still enforces the real rule. A positive viewer/editor role (or a concrete scope list without manage) hides them.
  • CLI — aiw whoami and aiw login surface the role + scopes; a 403 forbidden carrying a "missing required scope" message is translated into role guidance ("mint a key with the Admin role"), mirroring the existing 401 login-guidance.

Header format

Authorization: Bearer <token> (RFC 6750). Any other scheme returns 401 unauthorized with WWW-Authenticate: Bearer.

Error envelope

Auth failures use the same canonical envelope as every other error:

{
  "error": {
    "code": "unauthorized",
    "message": "Authorization header is required",
    "requestId": "01HY…"
  }
}
Status Code When
401 unauthorized Missing / malformed / invalid / expired token. WWW-Authenticate: Bearer set.
403 forbidden Token was valid but the subject's workspaceScopes does not include the target workspace. Also reserved for role-based checks in a later RBAC phase.

Operational routes stay open

/, /healthz, /readyz, /version, /docs, and /api/v1/openapi.json bypass the middleware. Load balancers and ops tooling always need to reach these, and the Scalar-rendered reference UI at /docs hardcodes the OpenAPI URL — both must load even when anonymousPolicy: reject is set. The middleware is mounted at /api/v1/workspaces/*, not /api/v1/*, to make this behavior explicit.

UI credential flow

The UI's header UserMenu renders one of three things, driven by GET /auth/config:

  1. Signed in (OIDC session) — the cookie survived a roundtrip through /auth/me. Shows the user's label + a logout button.
  2. "Log in" button — auth.oidc.client is configured but the browser has no (or an expired) session. Clicking redirects to /auth/login?redirect_after=<current>.
  3. Paste-a-token fallback — only mode: apiKey is configured (no OIDC login). Same TokenMenu that shipped in Phase 2, stores a wb_live_* token in localStorage, attaches Authorization: Bearer on every request.

When the UI gets a 401 on an API call and no paste-token is set, lib/api.ts quietly fetches /auth/config once — if OIDC login is on, it redirects to /auth/login so the user lands back where they started after re-authenticating.

Session cookie mechanics

After a successful /auth/callback the runtime sets a cookie (wb_session by default):

  • HttpOnly so JS can't read it (XSS becomes harder)
  • SameSite=Lax so top-level navigations through the IdP redirect still carry it back, but third-party contexts don't
  • Secure when the request arrived over HTTPS (honored via X-Forwarded-Proto when the runtime is behind a TLS proxy)
  • Max-Age matches the upstream expires_in (typically 1 hour)

The cookie value is v2.<iv>.<ciphertext>.<tag>; the payload is encrypted and authenticated with AES-256-GCM using key material from auth.oidc.client.sessionSecretRef (a SecretRef). When unset the runtime generates an ephemeral key at boot and logs a warning — fine for dev + single-replica, wrong for anything clustered.

The payload carries the upstream access token verbatim. Auth middleware promotes a valid cookie into a synthetic Authorization: Bearer header before the resolver runs, so the same OidcVerifier (iss/aud/exp/nbf/signature) validates both cookie sessions and API-client bearer calls. No second trust boundary.

PKCE flow

/auth/login picks a fresh 32-byte verifier, derives the code_challenge (SHA-256 + base64url), stashes the verifier + nonce + sanitized redirect_after in a short-TTL in-memory store keyed by the generated state, then 302s to the IdP's authorization endpoint with PKCE parameters.

/auth/callback re-reads the state, takes the entry (it's gone after one use, preventing replay), swaps code + code_verifier for tokens at the IdP, self-verifies the resulting access token through the same OidcVerifier the API uses (if it doesn't pass, the session is rejected — no trusting tokens that couldn't actually authenticate), signs the cookie, and redirects to redirect_after. redirect_after is validated against ^/[A-Za-z0-9\-._~!$&'()*+,;=:@%/?#]*$ and forced to / if it's absolute or protocol-relative — no open-redirect surface.

XSS caveat (API-key fallback only)

When the UI is running in mode: apiKey (no OIDC login), the paste-a-token path stores the token in localStorage, which is readable by any JS on the origin. That's acceptable for the self-hosted workbench UI (whose trust boundary is the runtime's own deployment) but not for pages embedding third-party scripts. OIDC login (Phase 3b) avoids this because the session cookie is HttpOnly.

Threat model

  • External attackers on the open internet. The auth boundary keeps unauthenticated traffic away from the data plane. Without it operators must front the runtime with a proxy that enforces auth.
  • Credential leakage in logs / envelopes. Tokens never appear in log output, error messages, or response bodies. requestId is the only ID that traces a request end-to-end.
  • Timing attacks on token lookup. Tokens are compared in constant time — the API-key path stores a salted scrypt digest (scrypt$<salt>$<digest>) and uses timingSafeEqual; OIDC uses signature verification.
  • Basic resource ceilings. The TypeScript runtime rejects /api/v1/workspaces/* request bodies over 10 MB by default, raises that to 50 MB only for explicit ingest routes, and caps the highest-risk text/vector fields before chunking, embedding, or search dispatch.

Out of scope for now:

  • Distributed denial-of-service and aggregate quotas. The runtime ships an in-process per-IP limiter for /api/v1/* and /auth/*, plus request-size limits, but buckets are per replica. Multi-replica deployments still need a WAF/API gateway for global ceilings and workspace/user quotas.
  • Complete rate-limit / mutation audit coverage. Sensitive operations, OIDC login/refresh/logout, failed /api/v1/* auth decisions, and bootstrap-token use emit structured audit events today. Rate-limit denials and high-volume document/chunk mutation are still tracked as audit gaps.

Rollout plan

Phase Ships Status
1 Middleware, config, disabled mode ✅ shipped
2 mode: apiKey — workspace-scoped wb_live_* keys, issue/revoke routes, UI ✅ shipped
3a mode: oidc — JWT verification via JWKS; any mode enables both ✅ shipped
3b Browser OIDC login flow (PKCE) — replaces paste-a-token with /auth/{login,callback,me,logout} + encrypted session cookie ✅ shipped
3c Silent refresh via refresh_token grant, so users don't see mid-session re-logins ✅ shipped
3d CLI OIDC device-flow (RFC 8628) via /auth/device/{authorize,token} proxy ✅ shipped (0.2.0)
4 Roles + per-route enforcement; audit logging later

Each phase is independently shippable. disabled stays the default until the operator explicitly opts in.

API keys (Phase 2)

Wire format: wb_live_<12-char-prefix>_<32-char-secret>, mirroring Stripe (sk_live_*) and GitHub (ghp_*). The prefix half is public (logged, indexed), the secret half is never persisted — only a scrypt-salted digest of the full token is stored. That makes leaked keys immediately greppable in source control and unlocks public secret-scanning.

Routes:

  • POST /api/v1/workspaces/{w}/api-keys — body {label, expiresAt?}; response {plaintext, key}. The plaintext field is returned exactly once and is never retrievable again.
  • GET /api/v1/workspaces/{w}/api-keys — lists all keys for the workspace, including revoked ones (with revokedAt populated). The hash column is never exposed.
  • DELETE /api/v1/workspaces/{w}/api-keys/{keyId} — soft-revoke. Leaves the row visible with revokedAt set; next request bearing the token gets 401 unauthorized.

Storage: two Data API Tables under the Astra control plane — wb_api_key_by_workspace (primary, partitioned by workspace) and wb_api_key_lookup (secondary, partitioned by prefix) so the verifier resolves a prefix in O(1) without scanning every workspace's key list on every request. Memory and file backends keep in-process equivalents.

Verifier behavior: the ApiKeyVerifier parses the wire shape, looks up the record by prefix, rejects revoked / expired keys, and constant-time-compares the stored digest. On success it bumps lastUsedAt as a fire-and-forget so operators can see which keys are actually in use.

The runtime never auto-creates an initial bootstrap key — that's a Phase 4 concern. For strict deployments today, set auth.bootstrapTokenRef to a 32+ character SecretRef, call the API with Authorization: Bearer <bootstrap-token> to create the first workspace/API key, then remove or rotate that bootstrap secret.

Bootstrap operator token

auth.bootstrapTokenRef is an optional SecretRef accepted when auth.mode is apiKey, oidc, or any. The resolved bearer token authenticates as an unscoped operator subject (workspaceScopes: null), so it can create the first workspace and issue the first workspace-scoped API key while anonymousPolicy: reject is already enforced.

Example:

auth:
  mode: apiKey
  anonymousPolicy: reject
  bootstrapTokenRef: env:WB_BOOTSTRAP_TOKEN

Use a high-entropy value, store it outside source control, and rotate or remove it after normal operator access is established.

Secret rotation

Every credential the runtime touches lives behind a SecretRef — an env:NAME or file:/path pointer, never a literal value. The control plane (Astra tables, the file JSON root, SQLite) only ever stores the ref; the SecretResolver materializes the value in-process, at use time. Two consequences shape rotation:

  • The secret store and the control plane are separate. Rotating a provider key, an OIDC client secret, or an Astra token is a change to the secret source (your env / mounted file / secret manager), not a database migration. Records that point at the ref are untouched.
  • Nothing reads a secret back out over the wire. GET /setup-status reports managedEnv.configuredKeys — the names of the managed env keys that currently resolve to a non-empty value — so the settings UI can confirm a credential is present without ever returning the value. Service and MCP-server records expose their credentialRef (the pointer), never the resolved secret. The wire-leak guard (runtimes/typescript/tests/security/wire-leak.test.ts) pins this for every credential-carrying surface.

The mechanics differ by credential class.

Workspace API keys (wb_live_*)

API keys are rotate-by-replacement: there is no in-place "change the secret" — you revoke the old key and mint a new one.

  1. Mint the replacement first so the integration never goes dark: POST /api/v1/workspaces/{w}/api-keys with the role/scopes the consumer needs (role: viewer|editor|admin, or an explicit scopes array — see Privilege scopes). The plaintext field is returned exactly once; store it in the consumer's secret source.
  2. Cut the consumer over to the new token.
  3. Revoke the old key: DELETE /api/v1/workspaces/{w}/api-keys/{keyId}. This is a soft-revoke — the row stays visible with revokedAt set, and the next request bearing the old token gets 401 unauthorized.

Issuing and revoking keys both require the manage scope (admin role). In the web UI this is the API-keys panel on the workspace settings page; via the CLI, aiw surfaces role-aware guidance on a 403. Rotate a key whenever its scopes change — narrowing a key from admin to editor means minting a new editor key and revoking the old one, since scopes are fixed at issue time.

OIDC client secret

The confidential-client secret used by the browser login flow is a SecretRef at auth.oidc.client.clientSecretRef (public clients omit it). To rotate:

  1. Add the new secret at the IdP (most IdPs allow two active client secrets during a rollover window).
  2. Update the value behind clientSecretRef in the runtime's secret source and restart so the new value is resolved at boot.
  3. Retire the old secret at the IdP.

The session-cookie key (auth.oidc.client.sessionSecretRef) rotates the same way — update the ref and restart. There is no dual-key validation period: sessions encrypted with the old key stop decrypting and those users re-login (see Session key rotation). The bootstrap operator token (auth.bootstrapTokenRef) likewise rotates by updating its ref and restarting; remove it entirely once normal operator access exists.

Provider API keys (OpenRouter / OpenAI / Cohere / …)

LLM, embedding, and reranking services authenticate with a provider key resolved from the service's credentialRef, falling back to the runtime's global chat.tokenRef (default env:OPENROUTER_API_KEY) when a service sets none. Two rotation paths, depending on where the ref points:

  • Repoint the ref's source (recommended for env: / file: refs). Update the value in the env / mounted file / secret manager that credentialRef (or chat.tokenRef) names, then restart the runtime so the new value is picked up and provider clients reconnect with it. The service record is unchanged — it still points at the same ref.
  • Paste a new key at /settings (single-user / auth: disabled, or the first-run setup wizard). The settings page writes the managed env file via POST /setup/env and prompts for a restart; on the next boot the runtime resolves the new value. configuredKeys flips to include the key name once it resolves — confirming presence without exposing the value.

Either way the secret never enters the control plane. To point a service at a different ref (not just a new value behind the same ref), PATCH …/llm-services/{id} (or the embedding/reranking equivalent) with a new credentialRef; the response echoes the ref, never the resolved secret.

External MCP-server credentials

A registered MCP server's bearer credential is a SecretRef on the server record's credentialRef (see external MCP servers). The runtime resolves it per connection, at tool-discovery and tool-call time — so rotation takes effect on the next turn, no restart required:

  • New value, same ref: update the env / file source the credentialRef names. The next agent turn reconnects with the fresh value.
  • New ref: PATCH /api/v1/workspaces/{w}/mcp-servers/{id} with the new credentialRef (an admin/manage-shaped surface is not required — registering and editing MCP servers is workspace write content). The wire response carries the ref but never the resolved bearer token.

OIDC (Phase 3a)

Any OIDC-compliant issuer that publishes a JWKS works. Typical setups: Auth0, Okta, Keycloak, Azure AD, Google — or a self-hosted IdP like Dex / Ory Hydra.

Startup. When mode is oidc or any, the runtime resolves the JWKS URL. If auth.oidc.jwksUri is set in config it's used verbatim; otherwise the runtime issues a GET to ${issuer}/.well-known/openid-configuration and reads jwks_uri from the response. This happens once at boot; startup fails if discovery fails. The key set itself is lazy-loaded on the first verification and rotates automatically when a token's kid doesn't match any cached key.

Per-request verification. On every authenticated call the verifier:

  1. Rejects obviously non-JWT tokens (returns null so the apiKey verifier can try them in mode: any).
  2. Validates the JWS signature against the JWKS.
  3. Validates iss exactly matches auth.oidc.issuer.
  4. Validates aud contains one of the configured audiences.
  5. Validates exp and nbf with clockToleranceSeconds of skew.
  6. Maps the claims onto AuthSubject using auth.oidc.claims.

Any failure throws UnauthorizedError with a short, safe message (oidc token has expired, signature did not verify, etc.) — the raw jose error is never forwarded to clients.

Workspace authorization. The workspaceScopes claim — an array of workspace IDs, or a space-separated string — drives the same workspace-route wrapper that API-key subjects use. Tokens with the claim set to JSON null are treated as unscoped / admin and may reach any workspace (matches the "operator tokens" escape hatch described above).

Example provisioning (Keycloak). Add a user attribute wb_workspace_scopes = ["ws-alice-staging", "ws-alice-prod"], add a "Script" or "Hardcoded attribute" mapper that copies it into the access-token claim of the same name, and point auth.oidc.claims.workspaceScopes at it. Same pattern applies to any other IdP with attribute-to-claim mapping.

any mode. Both verifiers run in one resolver; order is apiKey → oidc. Each verifier examines the token shape:

  • parseToken() in the apiKey verifier returns null on anything that isn't wb_live_<12>_<32>, so JWTs skip it.
  • OidcVerifier tests the token against a <b64url>.<b64url>.<b64url> regex and returns null for anything that doesn't match, so wb_live_* tokens skip it.

A token that matches neither shape gets a generic 401 token did not match any configured auth scheme.

Browser login (Phase 3b)

When auth.oidc.client is present the runtime mounts five endpoints that let the bundled web UI drive the standard Authorization Code + PKCE flow without the operator ever pasting a token:

Endpoint Purpose
GET /auth/config Tells the UI (and CLI) which credential surfaces are wired up
GET /auth/login 302 to the IdP's authorization endpoint; stashes the PKCE verifier + state
GET /auth/callback Swaps code for tokens, self-verifies, sets the session cookie, redirects
GET /auth/me Current authenticated subject, or 401
POST /auth/logout Clears the cookie
POST /auth/device/authorize Device-flow start — fronts the IdP's RFC 8628 device authorization endpoint for the CLI (Phase 3d)
POST /auth/device/token Device-flow poll — exchanges the device_code for a verified access token (Phase 3d)

Configuration

auth:
  mode: oidc                  # or `any`
  anonymousPolicy: reject
  oidc:
    issuer: https://login.example.com/realms/workbench
    audience: ai-workbench
    client:
      clientId: ai-workbench-ui
      # clientSecretRef: env:OIDC_CLIENT_SECRET  # omit for public clients
      # redirectPath: /auth/callback
      # postLogoutPath: /
      # scopes: [openid, profile, email]
      # sessionCookieName: wb_session
      sessionSecretRef: env:WB_SESSION_SECRET    # 32+ bytes; cookie encryption key

redirectPath must be registered in the IdP's allowed redirect URIs. Most IdPs take the absolute URL — the runtime derives that by combining the request host + X-Forwarded-Proto with the configured path.

Operational notes

  • Single replica for the state store. The PKCE verifier + state live in an in-process map with a 10-minute TTL. If you run N replicas behind a load balancer, either pin OAuth state to one replica (sticky sessions for /auth/*) or replace MemoryPendingLoginStore with something shared — the seam is the PendingLoginStore interface.
  • Session key rotation. Rotate by updating sessionSecretRef and restarting. Sessions encrypted with the old key stop decrypting and users re-login. There's no dual-key validation period yet.
  • Silent refresh keeps the cookie ahead of the curve (Phase 3c). When the IdP returns a refresh_token on the initial code exchange, the runtime stores it in the same encrypted session cookie as the access token. The UI calls POST /auth/refresh (a) on a timer at ~80% of the access-token lifetime, and (b) as a fallback when an API call comes back 401. The runtime swaps the refresh token at the IdP, sets a fresh Set-Cookie, and the UI retries — no browser redirect, no in-flight blip. When refresh is unavailable (no refresh_token, IdP rejected the rotation, or the runtime's verifier rejects the new access token) the UI falls through to the login redirect as before.
  • Logout does not RP-initiate. POST /auth/logout clears the local session cookie but does not redirect through the IdP's end_session_endpoint. Browsers remain logged in at the IdP (intentional for shared-device scenarios — users stay signed into Okta even after clicking "Log out" here). RP-initiated logout can come in a follow-up.

Silent refresh (Phase 3c)

The session cookie carries the IdP's refresh_token alongside the access token, both inside the same encrypted payload. That changes exactly one threat-model line item from before: cookie theft used to give an attacker the active session until access-token expiry (typically an hour). With the refresh token in the cookie, theft gives the attacker a session as long as the IdP's refresh-token lifetime allows. Two mitigations:

  1. The cookie remains HttpOnly + encrypted/authenticated, so JS still can't read or forge it. The threat is exfiltration via a network MITM or browser compromise, not XSS.
  2. Operators with sensitive deployments can disable refresh simply by setting their IdP's app to not issue refresh_token for browser flows. The runtime degrades gracefully: canRefresh: false in /auth/me, no scheduled refresh on the UI side, behavior reverts to Phase 3b (re-login on expiry).

POST /auth/refresh

Accepts the session cookie and returns:

{ "ok": true, "expiresAt": 1735689600 }

with a fresh Set-Cookie carrying the new access token (and any rotated refresh token). On failure — no cookie, no refresh_token in the payload, IdP rejected the grant, or the new access token doesn't pass the runtime's own verifier — the endpoint clears the cookie and returns 401 with one of: no_refresh_token, refresh_failed, or token_validation_failed.

GET /auth/me additions

{
  "id": "alice",
  "label": "alice@example.com",
  "type": "oidc",
  "workspaceScopes": ["…"],
  "expiresAt": 1735689600,
  "canRefresh": true
}

expiresAt is read out of the JWT's exp claim (the token has already passed verification at this point — we're not re-validating, just exposing the value). It's null for opaque tokens. canRefresh mirrors whether a refresh_token is in the cookie.

GET /auth/config additions

Adds refreshPath: "/auth/refresh" (or null when login isn't configured). The UI keys off this to decide whether to schedule the timer at all.

UI scheduling

apps/web/src/hooks/useSession.ts:useSilentRefresh registers a single setTimeout that fires at ~80% of the access token's remaining lifetime, clamped to [30s, 30min]. On success it invalidates ["auth", "me"] so the next render re-reads expiresAt and the loop continues.

apps/web/src/lib/api.ts:request runs a single-flight refresh attempt on any 401: concurrent in-flight queries all wait on the same /auth/refresh call and either retry together or fall through to the login redirect together.

CLI device-flow login (Phase 3d, RFC 8628)

aiw login --oidc opens an OAuth 2.0 Device Authorization Grant against the runtime instead of pasting an API key. The runtime fronts the IdP's device endpoints, so the CLI never needs the issuer URL and the IdP client secret stays server-side.

/auth/config additions

{
  "modes": { "oidc": true, "apiKey": true, "device": true },
  "deviceAuthorizePath": "/auth/device/authorize",
  "deviceTokenPath": "/auth/device/token"
}

modes.device is true when the IdP's OIDC discovery document advertises a device_authorization_endpoint. When it isn't, both device routes return 501 device_flow_not_supported and the CLI falls back to the paste-a-token path.

POST /auth/device/authorize

Proxies to the IdP's device authorization endpoint, attaching the configured client_id and any default scopes server-side, and returns the standard RFC 8628 envelope verbatim:

{
  "device_code": "GmRhmhcxhwAzkoEqiMEg_DnyEysNkuNhszIySk9eS",
  "user_code": "WDJB-MJHT",
  "verification_uri": "https://login.example.com/device",
  "verification_uri_complete": "https://login.example.com/device?user_code=WDJB-MJHT",
  "expires_in": 600,
  "interval": 5
}

POST /auth/device/token

Polled by the CLI with { "device_code": "…" }. Forwards grant_type=urn:ietf:params:oauth:grant-type:device_code to the IdP, then validates the returned access token through the same OidcVerifier the API uses (iss/aud/exp/nbf/signature). Returns { access_token, refresh_token?, expires_in } on success and mirrors the IdP's authorization_pending, slow_down, access_denied, expired_token codes as 400 responses on failure.

The resulting JWT is what the existing auth middleware already accepts as Authorization: Bearer … — no new verifier path either side of the proxy. CLI profiles persist the access token, optional refresh token, and expiry under a new oidc block; the HTTP client prefers the OIDC bearer over the API key when both are present (see packages/aiw-cli/README.md).

Audit

Both routes emit structured audit events with actions auth.device.authorize and auth.device.token. See audit.md for the full action union.