boma/docs/security/accepted-risks.md
sjat 2f4218814a Reconcile image pinning to a tiered tag@digest rule
Resolve the conflict between ADR-011 (tags-not-digests) and the security work
(digest pinning) with one coherent rule that respects ADR-011's stateless/stateful
split:

- Stateful → pin `tag@digest` (readable tag + integrity digest): legible diffs AND
  tamper-evidence. Snapshots cover broken updates; the digest covers swapped images.
- Stateless → rolling tags (latest/stable); digest-pinning would defeat the rolling
  design. Integrity rests on official/verified images + disposability.

Aligned across ADR-011 (decision 2), ADR-004 (image management), ADR-002
(supply-chain row), accepted-risk R1, the service checklist, and TODO 15.6.
TODO 16.7 marked decided.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-06-04 19:21:36 +02:00

1.9 KiB

Accepted security risks

Conscious security trade-offs we are choosing to live with — recorded so "what we are not doing" is explicit and revisitable, not forgotten. This register is a living document, deliberately kept out of ADR-002 (which records durable decisions) so the ADR stays stable.

Owned by ADR-002 (Security baseline and strategy). Re-challenged during the periodic security review (planned /security-review; see docs/TODO.md).

Each entry: the risk · why we accept it (rationale) · what would make us revisit (trigger).

# Accepted risk Rationale Revisit trigger
R1 Active supply-chain scanning deferred — baseline hygiene is required (tiered image pinning per ADR-011 — stateful tag@digest, stateless rolling — prefer official/verified images; gitleaks), but images and dependencies are not actively vulnerability-scanned (Trivy/Grype) or signature-verified Scanning only pays off with the capacity to triage its output; the realistic threat is opportunistic, not a targeted supply-chain attack A monitoring/triage stack is live; hosting high-value data/finances for others; a relevant upstream compromise
R2 SELinux not used — no SELinux mandatory access control AppArmor — Debian-native and enforced via the CIS baseline — already provides MAC; adding SELinux means two MAC systems, non-native to Debian, for no real gain A service that ships and requires its own SELinux policy; threat model shifts toward targeted attackers

Last reviewed: 2026-06-04. The prior gaps (full CIS hardening, SELinux/AppArmor, IDS) were re-challenged and adopted rather than accepted: CIS Debian L1+L2 + CIS Docker, AppArmor (enforce), AIDE file-integrity, and Suricata network IDS are now part of the security strategy (ADR-002). See STATUS.md / docs/TODO.md for build status. As CIS is implemented, any specific item that proves impractical is added here as a named exception.