A server that issues Secure session cookies cannot sign anyone in on a
plain http:// page: the browser drops the cookie. The login request was
still verified, the MFA ticket minted and then claimed, and the next
attempt answered "Invalid or expired challenge".
The web client now sends an optional clientTransport on the browser
sign-in requests (password login, passkey start, both MFA completions).
When the server issues Secure cookies and the page is plain http on a
non-loopback host, the request is refused with 409
auth.session.insecure_transport before the password is checked, a
ticket is minted or claimed, a code is spent, or a passkey challenge is
issued. A request without the field is never refused. The SSO start
takes client_proto/client_host and sends such a page back to the login
page instead of to the provider.
GET /api/auth/registration-status publishes sessionCookieSecure, and the
login page shows the reason with both fixes and disables the sign-in
controls before anything is sent; on localhost it shows a note only.
SESSION_COOKIE_SECURE keeps its meaning; the header heuristic log line
stays.
Second-factor management has been cookie-only since v1.23. The gate is right:
a Bearer token is a credential whose provenance the server cannot see, and
tearing down a second factor must not be reachable from the weaker of an
interactive login and a value pasted into a script. What was missing was never
Bearer access to those routes — it was a way to say, over a transport with no
session row, that the human holding this device just re-proved a factor.
An elevation is that proof. It is minted only against a re-proved account
password or primary passkey, bound to the exact token that re-proved, single-use
via a conditional UPDATE, five-minute-lived to match the cookie path's step-up
window, and stored hashed. A stolen token mints nothing; a second token cannot
redeem another's elevation; a password change drops every one the account holds.
requireMfaManagementAuth is the one gate the management routes share. On a
cookie session it delegates to the original helpers unchanged, so the web flow
runs the code it always did. requireAdmin stays cookie-only and out of reach.
Add an opt-in "remember this device" at the second-factor step. On opt-in
a random token is minted, set in an httpOnly+Secure+SameSite=Strict cookie,
and only its HMAC hash is stored in a new TrustedDevice table. A later sign-in
from the same browser still requires the password (factor 1); a matching,
unexpired trusted device lets the login skip factor 2 only.
The token is never accepted for step-up — a trusted-device login does not stamp
mfaVerifiedAt — so a stolen device cookie cannot reach a destructive action.
Trusted devices are listed and revocable from the security surface, are revoked
wholesale when the second factor is removed or the user signs out everywhere,
and cascade away on account deletion. A recovery-code login never trusts the
browser. Migration 0204 adds the table (and the instance-wide mfa_required
policy column that the enforcement work reads).
Introduce a dedicated /settings/security section that gathers every
account-protection control in one place: TOTP enrolment (QR plus manual
secret, confirm, recovery codes shown once with copy and download),
WebAuthn security keys as a second factor (register, list with last-used,
rename, step-up-gated removal), recovery-code count and regeneration, and
primary passkey management.
The second-factor WebAuthn path keeps its own credential store, separate
from primary passkeys, and uses non-resident keys so an account can hold
many. Relying-party resolution is shared with the passkey path. A status
endpoint backs the hub; the step-up gate now recognises a registered
security key as an active second factor so a WebAuthn-only account can
still reach the gated actions.
Add the TOTP enroll/confirm/disable surface and Argon2id-hashed recovery
codes as the v1.23 second factor.
- totp.ts wraps otpauth (zero-dep) pinned to the interop floor (SHA-1, 6
digits, 30 s) with a +/-1 drift window. Replay protection persists the last
accepted time-step per account (User.totpLastStep, migration
0202_v123_totp_laststep) and rejects any step that is not strictly newer,
so a captured code dies the instant it is accepted once.
- recovery-codes.ts issues ten single-use, high-entropy codes, Argon2id-
hashed at rest, shown once; regeneration replaces the entire prior set in a
transaction and verification burns the matched code with a guarded update.
- The TOTP secret is stored AES-256-GCM encrypted (already registered in the
encrypted-columns registry + rotation script); decrypt is fail-closed.
- Routes: setup (pending secret), confirm (activate + issue recovery codes),
disable (step-up + current factor), recovery-codes/regenerate (step-up).
Setup/confirm are cookie-only; disable/regenerate add requireFreshMfa.
- scripts/disable-mfa.ts is the operator escape hatch for a locked-out
self-hoster, audited, run via pnpm dlx tsx.
Marc-André Bombeck