Authenticate socket.io incoming connections with JWTs. This is useful if you are build a single page application and you are not using cookies as explained in this blog post: Cookies vs Tokens. Getting auth right with Angular.JS.

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npm install socketio-jwt

// set authorization for socket.io
io.sockets
  .on('connection', socketioJwt.authorize({
    secret: 'your secret or public key',
    timeout: 15000 // 15 seconds to send the authentication message
  })).on('authenticated', function(socket) {
    //this socket is authenticated, we are good to handle more events from it.
    console.log('hello! ' + socket.decoded_token.name);
  });

Note: If you are using a base64-encoded secret (e.g. your Auth0 secret key), you need to convert it to a Buffer: Buffer('your secret key', 'base64')

Client side

var socket = io.connect('http://localhost:9000');
socket.on('connect', function () {
  socket
    .emit('authenticate', {token: jwt}) //send the jwt
    .on('authenticated', function () {
      //do other things
    })
    .on('unauthorized', function(msg) {
      console.log("unauthorized: " + JSON.stringify(msg.data));
      throw new Error(msg.data.type);
    })
});

The previous approach uses a second roundtrip to send the jwt. There is a way you can authenticate on the handshake by sending the JWT as a query string, the caveat is that intermediary HTTP servers can log the url.

var io            = require("socket.io")(server);
var socketioJwt   = require("socketio-jwt");

//// With socket.io < 1.0 ////
io.set('authorization', socketioJwt.authorize({
  secret: 'your secret or public key',
  handshake: true
}));

//// With socket.io >= 1.0 ////
io.use(socketioJwt.authorize({
  secret: 'your secret or public key',
  handshake: true
}));

io.on('connection', function (socket) {
  // in socket.io < 1.0
  console.log('hello!', socket.handshake.decoded_token.name);

  // in socket.io 1.0
  console.log('hello! ', socket.decoded_token.name);
})

For more validation options see auth0/jsonwebtoken.

Client side

Append the jwt token using query string:

var socket = io.connect('http://localhost:9000', {
  'query': 'token=' + your_jwt
});

Server side

When you sign the token with an expiration time:

var token = jwt.sign(user_profile, jwt_secret, {expiresInMinutes: 60});

Your client-side code should handle it as below:

Client side

socket.on("unauthorized", function(error) {
  if (error.data.type == "UnauthorizedError" || error.data.code == "invalid_token") {
    // redirect user to login page perhaps?
    console.log("User's token has expired");
  }
});

Token sent by client is invalid.

Server side:

No further configuration needed.

Client side

Add a callback client-side to execute socket disconnect server-side.

socket.on("unauthorized", function(error, callback) {
  if (error.data.type == "UnauthorizedError" || error.data.code == "invalid_token") {
    // redirect user to login page perhaps or execute callback:
    callback();
    console.log("User's token has expired");
  }
});

Server side

To disconnect socket server-side without client-side callback:

io.sockets.on('connection', socketioJwt.authorize({
  secret: 'secret goes here',
  // No client-side callback, terminate connection server-side
  callback: false
}))

Client side

Nothing needs to be changed client-side if callback is false.

Server side

To disconnect socket server-side while giving client-side 15 seconds to execute callback:

io.sockets.on('connection', socketioJwt.authorize({
  secret: 'secret goes here',
  // Delay server-side socket disconnect to wait for client-side callback
  callback: 15000
}))

Your client-side code should handle it as below:

Client side

socket.on("unauthorized", function(error, callback) {
  if (error.data.type == "UnauthorizedError" || error.data.code == "invalid_token") {
    // redirect user to login page perhaps or execute callback:
    callback();
    console.log("User's token has expired");
  }
});

You can pass a function instead of a string when configuring secret. This function receives the request, the decoded token and a callback. This way, you are allowed to use a different secret based on the request and / or the provided token.

Server side

var SECRETS = {
  'user1': 'secret 1',
  'user2': 'secret 2'
}

io.use(socketioJwt.authorize({
  secret: function(request, decodedToken, callback) {
    // SECRETS[decodedToken.userId] will be used as a secret or
    // public key for connection user.

    callback(null, SECRETS[decodedToken.userId]);
  },
  handshake: false
}));

Feel like contributing to this repo? We're glad to hear that! Before you start contributing please visit our Contributing Guideline.

Here you can also find the PR template to fill once creating a PR. It will automatically appear once you open a pull request.

Spotted a bug or any other kind of issue? We're just humans and we're always waiting for constructive feedback! Check our section on how to report issues!

Here you can also find the Issue template to fill once opening a new issue. It will automatically appear once you create an issue.

Feel like PRs and issues are not enough? Want to dive into further discussion about the tool? We created topics for each Auth0 Community repo so that you can join discussion on stack available on our repos. Here it is for this one: socketio-jwt

This project is licensed under the MIT license. See the LICENSE file for more info.

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