Docker User and Permission Check

Analyze Docker configurations for user, ownership, and permission issues in PHP containers.

Permission Check Patterns

Check	Risk	Detection
No USER instruction	Root execution	Missing USER in Dockerfile
Wrong UID/GID	Permission conflicts	Non-standard user IDs
COPY without --chown	Root-owned files	COPY without ownership
chmod 777	World-writable files	Overly permissive mode
Volume permission mismatch	Read/write failures	Host vs container UID
Read-only FS incompatibility	Runtime crashes	Missing tmpfs for writable dirs

Detection Patterns

1. USER Instruction Present

# INSECURE: No USER instruction (runs as root PID 1)
FROM php:8.4-fpm-alpine
COPY . /var/www/
CMD ["php-fpm"]

# SECURE: Non-root user defined
FROM php:8.4-fpm-alpine
RUN addgroup -g 1000 -S appgroup \
    && adduser -u 1000 -S appuser -G appgroup
USER appuser
CMD ["php-fpm"]

2. Correct UID/GID Convention

# Alpine: addgroup / adduser (BusyBox)
RUN addgroup -g 1000 -S appgroup \
    && adduser -u 1000 -S appuser -G appgroup -h /var/www -s /sbin/nologin

# Debian: groupadd / useradd (shadow)
RUN groupadd -g 1000 appgroup \
    && useradd -u 1000 -g appgroup -d /var/www -s /usr/sbin/nologin -M appuser

3. File Ownership After COPY

# INSECURE: Files owned by root after COPY
COPY . /var/www/

# SECURE: Set ownership during COPY
COPY --chown=appuser:appgroup . /var/www/

# SECURE: Set ownership in multi-stage
COPY --from=builder --chown=appuser:appgroup /app/vendor /var/www/vendor

4. No chmod 777

# INSECURE: World-writable permissions
RUN chmod -R 777 /var/www/var

# SECURE: Minimal permissions
RUN mkdir -p /var/www/var/cache /var/www/var/log \
    && chown -R appuser:appgroup /var/www/var \
    && chmod -R 755 /var/www/var

5. Volume Permissions

# PROBLEM: Host UID doesn't match container UID
services:
  php-fpm:
    volumes:
      - ./src:/var/www/src          # May cause permission issues

# SOLUTION: Read-only bind mounts + named volumes
services:
  php-fpm:
    user: "1000:1000"
    volumes:
      - ./src:/var/www/src:ro       # Read-only (no permission issues)
      - cache:/var/www/var/cache    # Named volume
      - logs:/var/www/var/log       # Named volume

6. Read-Only Filesystem Compatibility

services:
  php-fpm:
    read_only: true
    tmpfs:
      - /tmp:noexec,nosuid,size=64m
      - /var/run:noexec,nosuid,size=1m
    volumes:
      - cache:/var/www/var/cache
      - logs:/var/www/var/log

User Creation: Alpine vs Debian

# Alpine (BusyBox): -g GID -S system -u UID -G group -h home -s shell
RUN addgroup -g 1000 -S appgroup \
    && adduser -u 1000 -S appuser -G appgroup -h /var/www -s /sbin/nologin

# Debian (shadow): -g GID/group -u UID -d home -s shell -M no home dir
RUN groupadd -g 1000 appgroup \
    && useradd -u 1000 -g appgroup -d /var/www -s /usr/sbin/nologin -M appuser

# Using existing www-data (UID 82 on Alpine, 33 on Debian)
USER www-data

Grep Patterns

# USER instruction
Grep: "^USER " --glob "**/Dockerfile*"

# User creation commands
Grep: "adduser|useradd|addgroup|groupadd" --glob "**/Dockerfile*"

# COPY without --chown
Grep: "^COPY(?!.*--chown)" --glob "**/Dockerfile*"

# Overly permissive chmod
Grep: "chmod.*(777|666|a\+[rw])" --glob "**/Dockerfile*"

# chown commands
Grep: "chown" --glob "**/Dockerfile*"

# Read-only filesystem
Grep: "read_only:" --glob "**/docker-compose*.yml"

# tmpfs mounts
Grep: "tmpfs:" --glob "**/docker-compose*.yml"

Severity Classification

Pattern	Severity	Impact
No USER instruction (production)	Critical	Container runs as root
chmod 777 on application dirs	High	Any process can modify files
COPY without --chown (with USER)	High	Files inaccessible to app user
System UID (< 1000) for app user	Medium	Potential privilege confusion
Volume mount without :ro	Medium	Unnecessary write access
No read-only rootfs	Medium	Filesystem can be modified
Missing tmpfs for /tmp	Low	Temp files on persistent storage

Output Format

### Permission Issue: [Check Name]

**Severity:** Critical/High/Medium/Low
**File:** `<file_path>:<line>`
**Check:** USER / Ownership / chmod / Volume / Read-only FS

**Detection:**
[How the issue was identified]

**Risk:**
[Security or operational impact]

**Current:**
```dockerfile
// Current configuration

Remediation:

// Secure configuration

Platform Notes:

• Alpine: [Alpine-specific instructions]
• Debian: [Debian-specific instructions]