Add permission to control access to Rendered Context

[G1tClub]

NetBox version

4.6.1

Feature type

Data model extension

Proposed functionality

Issue #20929 introduced the render_config permission to control who can render and view a device's rendered configuration. This is a great improvement for protecting sensitive configuration data.

However, the Rendered Context tab remains visible in the UI and API. Similar to the concerns described in #20929, this can expose sensitive information in environments where the rendered context contains passwords, tokens, or other secrets.

Use case

Just like the rendered configuration, the rendered context may contain sensitive values that should not be visible to users who only need access to the device inventory.

Would it be possible to either:

1. Hide/disable Rendered Context when the render_config permission is not granted; or
2. Introduce a separate permission (e.g. render_context) to control access to the rendered context independently?

Database changes

No response

External dependencies

No response

[jeremystretch]

@G1tClub it's not quite clear what you're asking above. Are you proposing a new permission specifically to control a user's ability to view context data? That's probably not going to be doable, as the permissions framework does not support limiting access to specific attributes, only to entire objects.

[G1tClub]

@G1tClub it's not quite clear what you're asking above. Are you proposing a new permission specifically to control a user's ability to view context data? That's probably not going to be doable, as the permissions framework does not support limiting access to specific attributes, only to entire objects.

Thanks for your answer, I hope this clarifies the issue:

• I create a user and assign a custom permission.
• This permission is very limited: it does not include the render_config permission. The user only has View access and only for DCIM → Device.

• I assign this permission to the created user.
• When I log in as that user and click Render Config, I correctly receive a "You do not have permission to access this page" error. This is the expected behavior.
• However, when I click Config Context, I can still view all of the configuration context, including sensitive data that I would expect to be protected (see screenshot 2).

Expected behavior

A user without the render_config permission should not be able to view the configuration context containing sensitive data. There are multiple use cases where users need permission to view devices, but are not expected to have access to the device configuration or any configuration-related data.

[github-actions]

This is a reminder that additional information is needed in order to further triage this issue. If the requested details are not provided, the issue will soon be closed automatically.

[G1tClub]

@jeremystretch I tried to add the necessary information. Are you able to look into this before automatic closure?

[jeremystretch]

The render_config permission is expressly for exactly that: Rendering a configuration. It intentionally does not control access to config context data. That is controlled by permissions assigned to the config context model.