matrix-spec/specification/identity_service_api.rst

.. Copyright 2016 OpenMarket Ltd
.. Copyright 2017 Kamax.io
.. Copyright 2017 New Vector Ltd
.. Copyright 2018 New Vector Ltd
..
.. Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
.. you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
.. You may obtain a copy of the License at
..
..     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
..
.. Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
.. distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
.. WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
.. See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
.. limitations under the License.

Identity Service API
====================

{{unstable_warning_block_IDENTITY_RELEASE_LABEL}}

The Matrix client-server and server-server APIs are largely expressed in Matrix
user identifiers. From time to time, it is useful to refer to users by other
("third-party") identifiers, or "3PID"s, e.g. their email address or phone
number. This Identity Service Specification describes how mappings between
third-party identifiers and Matrix user identifiers can be established,
validated, and used. This description technically may apply to any 3PID, but in
practice has only been applied specifically to email addresses and phone numbers.

.. contents:: Table of Contents
.. sectnum::

Changelog
---------

.. topic:: Version: %IDENTITY_RELEASE_LABEL%
{{identity_service_changelog}}

This version of the specification is generated from
`matrix-doc <https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc>`_ as of Git commit
`{{git_version}} <https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc/tree/{{git_rev}}>`_.

For the full historical changelog, see
https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc/blob/master/changelogs/identity_service.rst


Other versions of this specification
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The following other versions are also available, in reverse chronological order:

- `HEAD <https://matrix.org/docs/spec/identity_service/unstable.html>`_: Includes all changes since the latest versioned release.
- `r0.3.0 <https://matrix.org/docs/spec/identity_service/r0.3.0.html>`_
- `r0.2.1 <https://matrix.org/docs/spec/identity_service/r0.2.1.html>`_
- `r0.2.0 <https://matrix.org/docs/spec/identity_service/r0.2.0.html>`_
- `r0.1.0 <https://matrix.org/docs/spec/identity_service/r0.1.0.html>`_

General principles
------------------

The purpose of an identity server is to validate, store, and answer questions
about the identities of users. In particular, it stores associations of the form
"identifier X represents the same user as identifier Y", where identities may
exist on different systems (such as email addresses, phone numbers,
Matrix user IDs, etc).

The identity server has some private-public keypairs. When asked about an
association, it will sign details of the association with its private key.
Clients may validate the assertions about associations by verifying the signature
with the public key of the identity server.

In general, identity servers are treated as reliable oracles. They do not
necessarily provide evidence that they have validated associations, but claim to
have done so. Establishing the trustworthiness of an individual identity server
is left as an exercise for the client.

3PID types are described in `3PID Types`_ Appendix.

API standards
-------------

The mandatory baseline for identity server communication in Matrix is exchanging
JSON objects over HTTP APIs. HTTPS is required for communication, and all API calls
use a Content-Type of ``application/json``. In addition, strings MUST be encoded as
UTF-8.

Any errors which occur at the Matrix API level MUST return a "standard error response".
This is a JSON object which looks like:

.. code:: json

  {
    "errcode": "<error code>",
    "error": "<error message>"
  }

The ``error`` string will be a human-readable error message, usually a sentence
explaining what went wrong. The ``errcode`` string will be a unique string
which can be used to handle an error message e.g. ``M_FORBIDDEN``. There may be
additional keys depending on the error, but the keys ``error`` and ``errcode``
MUST always be present.

Some standard error codes are below:

:``M_NOT_FOUND``:
  The resource requested could not be located.

:``M_MISSING_PARAMS``:
  The request was missing one or more parameters.

:``M_INVALID_PARAM``:
  The request contained one or more invalid parameters.

:``M_SESSION_NOT_VALIDATED``:
  The session has not been validated.

:``M_NO_VALID_SESSION``:
  A session could not be located for the given parameters.

:``M_SESSION_EXPIRED``:
  The session has expired and must be renewed.

:``M_INVALID_EMAIL``:
  The email address provided was not valid.

:``M_EMAIL_SEND_ERROR``:
  There was an error sending an email. Typically seen when attempting to verify
  ownership of a given email address.

:``M_INVALID_ADDRESS``:
  The provided third party address was not valid.

:``M_SEND_ERROR``:
  There was an error sending a notification. Typically seen when attempting to
  verify ownership of a given third party address.

:``M_UNRECOGNIZED``:
  The request contained an unrecognised value, such as an unknown token or medium.

:``M_THREEPID_IN_USE``:
  The third party identifier is already in use by another user. Typically this
  error will have an additional ``mxid`` property to indicate who owns the
  third party identifier.

:``M_UNKNOWN``:
  An unknown error has occurred.

Privacy
-------

Identity is a privacy-sensitive issue. While the identity server exists to
provide identity information, access should be restricted to avoid leaking
potentially sensitive data. In particular, being able to construct large-scale
connections between identities should be avoided. To this end, in general APIs
should allow a 3PID to be mapped to a Matrix user identity, but not in the other
direction (i.e. one should not be able to get all 3PIDs associated with a Matrix
user ID, or get all 3PIDs associated with a 3PID).

Version 1 API deprecation
-------------------------

.. TODO: Remove this section when the v1 API is removed.

As described on each of the version 1 endpoints, the v1 API is deprecated in
favour of the v2 API described here. The major difference, with the exception
of a few isolated cases, is that the v2 API requires authentication to ensure
the user has given permission for the identity server to operate on their data.

The v1 API is planned to be removed from the specification in a future version.

Clients SHOULD attempt the v2 endpoints first, and if they receive a ``404``,
``400``, or similar error they should try the v1 endpoint or fail the operation.
Clients are strongly encouraged to warn the user of the risks in using the v1 API,
if they are planning on using it.

Web browser clients
-------------------

It is realistic to expect that some clients will be written to be run within a web
browser or similar environment. In these cases, the identity server should respond to
pre-flight requests and supply Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS) headers on all
requests.

When a client approaches the server with a pre-flight (OPTIONS) request, the server
should respond with the CORS headers for that route. The recommended CORS headers
to be returned by servers on all requests are::

  Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *
  Access-Control-Allow-Methods: GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, OPTIONS
  Access-Control-Allow-Headers: Origin, X-Requested-With, Content-Type, Accept, Authorization

Authentication
--------------

Most ``v2`` endpoints in the Identity Service API require authentication in order
to ensure that the requesting user has accepted all relevant policies and is otherwise
permitted to make the request. The ``v1`` API (currently deprecated) does not require
this authentication, however using ``v1`` is strongly discouraged as it will be removed
in a future release.

Identity Servers use a scheme similar to the Client-Server API's concept of access
tokens to authenticate users. The access tokens provided by an Identity Server cannot
be used to authenticate Client-Server API requests.

An access token is provided to an endpoint in one of two ways:

1. Via a query string parameter, ``access_token=TheTokenHere``.
2. Via a request header, ``Authorization: Bearer TheTokenHere``.

Clients are encouraged to the use the ``Authorization`` header where possible to prevent
the access token being leaked in access/HTTP logs. The query string should only be used
in cases where the ``Authorization`` header is inaccessible for the client.

When credentials are required but missing or invalid, the HTTP call will return with a
status of 401 and the error code ``M_UNAUTHORIZED``.

{{v2_auth_is_http_api}}


.. _`agree to more terms`:

Terms of service
----------------

Identity Servers are encouraged to have terms of service (or similar policies) to
ensure that users have agreed to their data being processed by the server. To facilitate
this, an identity server can respond to almost any authenticated API endpoint with a
HTTP 403 and the error code ``M_TERMS_NOT_SIGNED``. The error code is used to indicate
that the user must accept new terms of service before being able to continue.

All endpoints which support authentication can return the ``M_TERMS_NOT_SIGNED`` error.
When clients receive the error, they are expected to make a call to ``GET /terms`` to
find out what terms the server offers. The client compares this to the ``m.accepted_terms``
account data for the user (described later) and presents the user with option to accept
the still-missing terms of service. After the user has made their selection, if applicable,
the client sends a request to ``POST /terms`` to indicate the user's acceptance. The
server cannot expect that the client will send acceptance for all pending terms, and the
client should not expect that the server will not respond with another ``M_TERMS_NOT_SIGNED``
on their next request. The terms the user has just accepted are appended to ``m.accepted_terms``.

{{m_accepted_terms_event}}

{{v2_terms_is_http_api}}


Status check
------------

{{ping_is_http_api}}

{{v2_ping_is_http_api}}

Key management
--------------

An identity server has some long-term public-private keypairs. These are named
in a scheme ``algorithm:identifier``, e.g. ``ed25519:0``. When signing an
association, the standard `Signing JSON`_ algorithm applies.

.. TODO: Actually allow identity servers to revoke all keys
         See: https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc/issues/1633
.. In the event of key compromise, the identity server may revoke any of its keys.
   An HTTP API is offered to get public keys, and check whether a particular key is
   valid.

The identity server may also keep track of some short-term public-private
keypairs, which may have different usage and lifetime characteristics than the
service's long-term keys.

{{pubkey_is_http_api}}

{{v2_pubkey_is_http_api}}

Association lookup
------------------

{{lookup_is_http_api}}

{{v2_lookup_is_http_api}}

Client behaviour
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

.. TODO: Remove this note when v1 is removed completely
.. Note::
   This section only covers the v2 lookup endpoint. The v1 endpoint is described
   in isolation above.

Prior to performing a lookup clients SHOULD make a request to the ``/hash_details``
endpoint to determine what algorithms the server supports (described in more detail
below). The client then uses this information to form a ``/lookup`` request and
receive known bindings from the server.

Clients MUST support at least the ``sha256`` algorithm.

Server behaviour
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

.. TODO: Remove this note when v1 is removed completely
.. Note::
   This section only covers the v2 lookup endpoint. The v1 endpoint is described
   in isolation above.

Servers, upon receipt of a ``/lookup`` request, will compare the query against
known bindings it has, hashing the identifiers it knows about as needed to
verify exact matches to the request.

Servers MUST support at least the ``sha256`` algorithm.

Algorithms
~~~~~~~~~~

Some algorithms are defined as part of the specification, however other formats
can be negotiated between the client and server using ``/hash_details``.

``sha256``
++++++++++

This algorithm MUST be supported by clients and servers at a minimum. It is
additionally the preferred algorithm for lookups.

When using this algorithm, the client converts the query first into strings
separated by spaces in the format ``<address> <medium> <pepper>``. The ``<pepper>``
is retrieved from ``/hash_details``, the ``<medium>`` is typically ``email`` or
``msisdn`` (both lowercase), and the ``<address>`` is the 3PID to search for.
For example, if the client wanted to know about ``alice@example.org``'s bindings,
it would first format the query as ``alice@example.org email ThePepperGoesHere``.

.. admonition:: Rationale

   Mediums and peppers are appended to the address to prevent a common prefix
   for each 3PID, helping prevent attackers from pre-computing the internal state
   of the hash function.

After formatting each query, the string is run through SHA-256 as defined by
`RFC 4634 <https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc4634>`_. The resulting bytes are then
encoded using URL-Safe `Unpadded Base64`_ (similar to `room version 4's
event ID format <../../rooms/v4.html#event-ids>`_).

An example set of queries when using the pepper ``matrixrocks`` would be::

  "alice@example.com email matrixrocks" -> "4kenr7N9drpCJ4AfalmlGQVsOn3o2RHjkADUpXJWZUc"
  "bob@example.com email matrixrocks"   -> "LJwSazmv46n0hlMlsb_iYxI0_HXEqy_yj6Jm636cdT8"
  "18005552067 msisdn matrixrocks"      -> "nlo35_T5fzSGZzJApqu8lgIudJvmOQtDaHtr-I4rU7I"


The set of hashes is then given as the ``addresses`` array in ``/lookup``. Note
that the pepper used MUST be supplied as ``pepper`` in the ``/lookup`` request.

``none``
++++++++

This algorithm performs plaintext lookups on the identity server. Typically this
algorithm should not be used due to the security concerns of unhashed identifiers,
however some scenarios (such as LDAP-backed identity servers) prevent the use of
hashed identifiers. Identity servers (and optionally clients) can use this algorithm
to perform those kinds of lookups.

Similar to the ``sha256`` algorithm, the client converts the queries into strings
separated by spaces in the format ``<address> <medium>`` - note the lack of ``<pepper>``.
For example, if the client wanted to know about ``alice@example.org``'s bindings,
it would format the query as ``alice@example.org email``.

The formatted strings are then given as the ``addresses`` in ``/lookup``. Note that
the ``pepper`` is still required, and must be provided to ensure the client has made
an appropriate request to ``/hash_details`` first.

Security considerations
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

.. Note::
   `MSC2134 <https://github.com/matrix-org/matrix-doc/pull/2134>`_ has much more
   information about the security considerations made for this section of the
   specification. This section covers the high-level details for why the specification
   is the way it is.

Typically the lookup endpoint is used when a client has an unknown 3PID it wants to
find a Matrix User ID for. Clients normally do this kind of lookup when inviting new
users to a room or searching a user's address book to find any Matrix users they may
not have discovered yet. Rogue or malicious identity servers could harvest this
unknown information and do nefarious things with it if it were sent in plain text.
In order to protect the privacy of users who might not have a Matrix identifier bound
to their 3PID addresses, the specification attempts to make it difficult to harvest
3PIDs.

.. admonition:: Rationale

   Hashing identifiers, while not perfect, helps make the effort required to harvest
   identifiers significantly higher. Phone numbers in particular are still difficult
   to protect with hashing, however hashing is objectively better than not.

   An alternative to hashing would be using bcrypt or similar with many rounds, however
   by nature of needing to serve mobile clients and clients on limited hardware the
   solution needs be kept relatively lightweight.

Clients should be cautious of servers not rotating their pepper very often, and
potentially of servers which use a weak pepper - these servers may be attempting to
brute force the identifiers or use rainbow tables to mine the addresses. Similarly,
clients which support the ``none`` algorithm should consider at least warning the user
of the risks in sending identifiers in plain text to the identity server.

Addresses are still potentially reversable using a calculated rainbow table given
some identifiers, such as phone numbers, common email address domains, and leaked
addresses are easily calculated. For example, phone numbers can have roughly 12
digits to them, making them an easier target for attack than email addresses.


Establishing associations
-------------------------

The flow for creating an association is session-based.

Within a session, one may prove that one has ownership of a 3PID.
Once this has been established, the user can form an association between that
3PID and a Matrix user ID. Note that this association is only proved one way;
a user can associate *any* Matrix user ID with a validated 3PID,
i.e. I can claim that any email address I own is associated with
@billg:microsoft.com.

Sessions are time-limited; a session is considered to have been modified when
it was created, and then when a validation is performed within it. A session can
only be checked for validation, and validation can only be performed within a
session, within a 24 hour period since its most recent modification. Any
attempts to perform these actions after the expiry will be rejected, and a new
session should be created and used instead.

To start a session, the client makes a request to the appropriate
``/requestToken`` endpoint. The identity server then sends a validation token
to the user, and the user provides the token to the client. The client then
provides the token to the appropriate ``/submitToken`` endpoint, completing the
session. At this point, the client should ``/bind`` the third party identifier
or leave it for another entity to bind.

Format of a validation token
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The format of the validation token is left up to the identity server: it
should choose one appropriate to the 3PID type. (For example, it would be
inappropriate to expect a user to copy a long passphrase including punctuation
from an SMS message into a client.)

Whatever format the identity server uses, the validation token must consist of
at most 255 Unicode codepoints. Clients must pass the token through without
modification.

Email associations
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

{{email_associations_is_http_api}}

{{v2_email_associations_is_http_api}}

Phone number associations
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

{{phone_associations_is_http_api}}

{{v2_phone_associations_is_http_api}}

General
~~~~~~~

{{associations_is_http_api}}

{{v2_associations_is_http_api}}

Invitation storage
------------------

An identity server can store pending invitations to a user's 3PID, which will
be retrieved and can be either notified on or look up when the 3PID is
associated with a Matrix user ID.

At a later point, if the owner of that particular 3PID binds it with a Matrix user
ID, the identity server will attempt to make an HTTP POST to the Matrix user's
homeserver via the `/3pid/onbind`_ endpoint. The request MUST be signed with a
long-term private key for the identity server.

{{store_invite_is_http_api}}

{{v2_store_invite_is_http_api}}

Ephemeral invitation signing
----------------------------

To aid clients who may not be able to perform crypto themselves, the identity
server offers some crypto functionality to help in accepting invitations.
This is less secure than the client doing it itself, but may be useful where
this isn't possible.

{{invitation_signing_is_http_api}}

{{v2_invitation_signing_is_http_api}}

.. _`Unpadded Base64`:  ../appendices.html#unpadded-base64
.. _`3PID Types`:  ../appendices.html#pid-types
.. _`Signing JSON`: ../appendices.html#signing-json
.. _`/3pid/onbind`: ../server_server/%SERVER_RELEASE_LABEL%.html#put-matrix-federation-v1-3pid-onbind