Fix Lack of Resources & Rate Limiting in Chi
Chi is a lightweight, idiomatic router, but its minimalism means it doesn't ship with default protection against resource exhaustion. Without explicit middleware, your service is a sitting duck for DoS attacks, Slowloris, and brute-force credential stuffing. To harden a Chi-based microservice, you must implement request throttling and strict connection timeouts at both the router and the HTTP server level.
The Vulnerable Pattern
package mainimport ( “net/http” “github.com/go-chi/chi/v5” )
func main() { r := chi.NewRouter() // VULNERABILITY: No rate limiting and no timeouts. // An attacker can flood this endpoint or open thousands of slow connections. r.Get(“/api/resource”, func(w http.ResponseWriter, r *http.Request) { w.Write([]byte(“vulnerable”)) })
http.ListenAndServe(":8080", r)
}
The Secure Implementation
The hardened configuration applies a multi-layered defense. First, 'httprate.LimitByIP' prevents volumetric abuse by dropping requests from high-frequency sources before they hit business logic. Second, 'middleware.Timeout' ensures that if a handler hangs (e.g., waiting on a slow DB query), it is killed to free up the goroutine. Finally, setting 'ReadTimeout' and 'WriteTimeout' on the 'http.Server' struct is critical; it closes connections that are too slow to send headers or receive data, effectively neutralizing Slowloris attacks that attempt to exhaust the server's file descriptors.
package mainimport ( “net/http” “time” “github.com/go-chi/chi/v5” “github.com/go-chi/chi/v5/middleware” “github.com/go-chi/httprate” )
func main() { r := chi.NewRouter()
// 1. Set a context timeout for all requests to prevent hanging handlers r.Use(middleware.Timeout(30 * time.Second)) // 2. Limit requests: 100 requests per minute per IP address r.Use(httprate.LimitByIP(100, 1*time.Minute)) r.Get("/api/resource", func(w http.ResponseWriter, r *http.Request) { w.Write([]byte("hardened")) }) // 3. Hard-limit the server's TCP connection deadlines srv := &http.Server{ Addr: ":8080", Handler: r, ReadTimeout: 5 * time.Second, WriteTimeout: 10 * time.Second, IdleTimeout: 120 * time.Second, } srv.ListenAndServe()
}
Your Chi API
might be exposed to Lack of Resources & Rate Limiting
74% of Chi apps fail this check. Hackers use automated scanners to find this specific flaw. Check your codebase before they do.
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