README.md

AppCheck Backend for Rust

What

An opinionated implementation of a Firebase AppCheck backend for performing token validation by Rust backend services. Assumes the implementing service utilizes the Tokio runtime for long-running Rust server apps, the Triggered crate to monitor for shutdown signals from the parent application, the Tracing crate for logging events from the caching task and Axum for the backend API.

How

The AppCheck backend Rust crate has three primary components:

• A TokenVerifier which contains the cached collection of RS256PublicKeys indexed by kid within a hash map that performs individual request token validation by verifying the supplied key against the configured app ID allow list, the project number and standard JWT claims and of course, the token signature.

• A JwkCache which runs as a persistent background task, spawned on the Tokio runtime and listening for shutdown signals from the parent application, meanwhile refreshing the cache of public keys used to perform token validation every X hours.

• A AppCheckLayer Axum middleware layer for injecting the check into the application router.

The settings.rs module provides the configuration knobs for customizing the behavior of the crate. The only required configuration value is the Firebase Project Number for configuring the iss and aud values of the auth token. Other config values of note are the allowlist of Firebase App IDs to allow as a possible sub token value, the duration the cache task should wait before refreshing the public keys and timing fields for validating the token is unexpired within tolerances and boundaries.