Things to be aware of when using devise's lockable

In other words

Think carefully when setting config.unlock_strategy to: time or : none

version

• Rails 6.1.0
• devise 4.7.3

About lockable

devise's lockable is to lock your account if you fail to log in several times. It's important to note that the account is locked, not the login locked. This means that all logged-in sessions accessed during account lock will be forcibly logged out.

If you use this to make the following mischief, you will be in trouble.

1. User A is logged in to a web service using devise
2. Another person tries to log in with User A's email address, but fails in succession, and User A's account is locked.
3. User A accesses the web service while the account is locked
4. Log out and user A will not be able to use the web service until unlocked

Workaround

I thought about three things to avoid.

Allow you to unlock with your email address

There is a thing called unlock_strategy in the devise setting, which can specify: email, : time,: both, : none.

• :email
• Email the link to unlock
• :time
• Locked until the specified time elapses
• :both
• Unlock with : email or spontaneously with: time or both
• This is the default, so is it relatively safe?
• :none
• There is no unlocking method. Is it only possible to play with the DB directly to unlock it?

Of these, in the case of : email and: both, the owner of the locked account can unlock it by himself, so there is little damage related to not being able to use the account. However, in the case of : time, if there is a user who is locked by mischief, you have to wait for it to be released over time (config.unlock_in defaults to 1 hour), so it can be a problem. appear.

Lock only login

If you want to lock your login instead of your account lock. I don't recommend it because it's very difficult, but there is a way to override active_for_authentication?. If you're using only lockable in a very simple app, you might do the following:

  def active_for_authentication?
    true
  end

But what if you also use confirmable? What if there are other specifications for activating various accounts? Don't easily set active_for_authentication? To true, which increases the extra security risk.

Do not use devise

For example, avoid devise

At the end

It's about security, so it's bad if it's wrong. We look forward to your strict comments.