Securing Solr Deployments

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The SearchStax Managed Search service takes the security of your Solr search infrastructure very seriously. We have built-in industry-standard security at the level of the cluster, network and SearchStax Managed Search dashboard.

• Industry-standard security at the Solr cluster level and network level.
• Environments secured with SSL out-of-the-box using Solr basic authentication.
• Custom firewall rules to lock down search infrastructure to a whitelist of IP addresses.
• Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) to increase log-on security.
• Regular quarterly scans to identify and patch any Apache Solr vulnerabilities.

Contents:

• Cluster Security
  • Connecting to the Cluster
  • Solr Basic Authentication
  • IP Filtering
  • API Keys
  • SearchStax User Roles
• Activity Log

Cluster Security

You can lock down your clusters as described below.

Connecting to the Cluster

SearchStax recommends that you situate your application infrastructure in the same local network as your hosting provider (for example, AWS or Azure). Internal network security for these hosting providers is extremely high and eliminates any chance of a hacker potentially sniffing your network traffic.

If your application is hosted elsewhere, try to host it as close to your search infrastructure as possible. This can be done by choosing the Cloud Provider Region which is closest to your application. This improves both security and performance.

Solr Basic Authentication

You can optionally enable the Solr Basic Authentication Plugin through the SearchStax Managed Search Dashboard. This restricts access to your Solr dashboard and demands authorization for query requests and index updates.

To enable the Basic Authentication plugin:

1. Select the desired Deployment and click the Security > Auth option in the menu tree.
2. Click the Enable button.

1. Click the Add User button.
2. Add a user, entering the username, password and role (see below). Click Add.

Note that Solr user accounts are independent of SearchStax user accounts.

To disable the Authentication and Authorization plugin, click on the Disable Auth button and confirm the action. Disabling Basic Auth erases all Solr users. (Again, Solr services will be restarted.)

Solr Basic Authentication provides four user roles:

• Admin users have full access to the views and tools of the Solr Dashboard. They can query the index from an external location using a /select command, and they can load new records into the index using a /update command.
• Non-Admin users can enter the Solr Dashboard but cannot view or make changes to the collections.
  • Read users can query the index using /select.
  • Write users can add new records to the index using /update.
  • ReadWrite users can use both /select and /update.

Role	Solr Dashoard	/select	/update
Admin	Full access to all features	✓	✓
Read	Limited access	✓
Write	Limited access		✓
ReadWrite	Limited access	✓	✓

IP Filtering

You can limit access to a Solr deployment to a list of IP addresses using the Security > IP Filter menu.

You can configure access for Solr+Zookeeper, Solr, and Zookeeper endpoints separately.

The addresses are expressed in IPv4 format, using the familiar dot-decimal notation. Ranges are specified using Classless Inter-Domain Routing (CIDR) format.

CIDR notation can be daunting, but note the following three examples of typical CIDR rules:

• 0.0.0.0/0 This rule permits unrestricted access to Solr. Any IP address whatsoever may connect, regardless of other filters you have added to the list. (SearchStax Managed Search will refuse to accept this value if you try to enter it for Zookeeper.)
• 64.118.123.159/32 This rule permits a connection from exactly one IP address.
• 64.118.123.0/24 This rule allows Solr access from any of the 256 IP addresses on a subnet.

The /n at the end of each rule is called the prefix length.

To limit access to a specific IP address or IP address range:

1. From within a Deployment’s details page, click on the Security > IP filter option.
2. Click on Add Row.
3. Add a specific IP address in the appropriate field. Note that SearchStax Managed Search can detect your computer’s IP address. Click My current IP to enter it automatically.
4. Select a service you need to limit access to (Solr+Zookeeper, Solr, or Zookeeper).
5. It is a Best Practice to enter your name or email in the label field.
6. Click Save changes.

To remove a filter, click on the X button and then Save changes.

API Keys

The Security > API Keys menu option exposes a table of the deployment’s API Keys.

SearchStax User Roles

Each SearchStax account is restricted to the Owner of that account plus any SearchStax users who have been granted access to that account by the owner. The additional users may be limited to specific roles at the Owner’s discretion. See SearchStax User Roles.

Activity Log

The SearchStax Managed Search activity log provides you with a list of all user actions within your account, including those of the SearchStax Support team. The list consists of a User column including email of the user who performed the logged change, his/her role, Timestamp of action in UTC, Action itself, Action detail and IP address where the action originated.