Secret leaks often occur when a sensitive piece of authentication data is stored with the source code of an application. Considering the source code is intended to be deployed across multiple assets, including source code repositories or application hosting servers, the secrets might get exposed to an unintended audience.
In most cases, trust boundaries are violated when a secret is exposed in a source code repository or an uncontrolled deployment environment. Unintended people who don’t need to know the secret might get access to it. They might then be able to use it to gain unwanted access to associated services or resources.
The trust issue can be more or less severe depending on the people’s role and entitlement.
If an attacker gains access to a Docker swarm token, they might be able to add new workers or managers to the swarm.
An attacker with control over a manager or worker node might be able to access sensitive information pushed to those malicious nodes. If the compromised token allows joining a manager node to the swarm, this one could compromise other legitimate nodes by pushing malicious tasks to them.
If the affected service is used to store or process personally identifiable information or other sensitive data, attackers knowing an authentication secret could be able to access it. Depending on the type of data that is compromised, it could lead to privacy violations, identity theft, financial loss, or other negative outcomes.
In most cases, a company suffering a sensitive data compromise will face a reputational loss when the security issue is publicly disclosed.
By obtaining a leaked secret, an attacker can gain control over your organization’s Docker Swarm infrastructure. They can modify DNS settings, redirect traffic, or launch malicious instances that can be used for various nefarious activities, including launching DDoS attacks, hosting phishing websites, or distributing malware. Malicious instances may also be used for resource-intensive tasks such as cryptocurrency mining.
This can result in legal liability, but also increased costs, degraded performance, and potential service disruptions.
Furthermore, corporate Docker Swarm infrastructures are often connected to other services and to the internal networks of the organization. Because of this, cloud infrastructure is often used by attackers as a gateway to other assets. Attackers can leverage this gateway to gain access to more services, to compromise more business-critical data and to cause more damage to the overall infrastructure.
Revoke the secret
Revoke any leaked secrets and remove them from the application source code.
Before revoking the secret, ensure that no other applications or processes are using it. Other usages of the secret will also be impacted when the secret is revoked.
Use a secret vault
A secret vault should be used to generate and store the new secret. This will ensure the secret’s security and prevent any further unexpected disclosure.
Depending on the development platform and the leaked secret type, multiple solutions are currently available.
SwarmJoin swarmJoin = new SwarmJoin();
swarmJoin.getRemoteAddrs().add("103.214.142.16:2377");
swarmJoin.setJoinToken("SWMTKN-1-0o98pf607edyse6ncy7j3z5tjz5ehz6wdmmlevttk55nkgpyh1-pq3hfd1utmhpjnd5hvom0z6va");
SwarmJoin swarmJoin = new SwarmJoin();
swarmJoin.getRemoteAddrs().add("103.214.142.16:2377");
swarmJoin.setJoinToken(System.getenv("JOIN_TOKEN"));
Docker Documentation - docker swarm join-token