Intent to Prototype: Support targetAddressSpace option for WebSockets

[Chromestatus]

Contact emails

cth...@chromium.org

Explainer

https://github.com/WICG/local-network-access/issues/126

Specification

https://github.com/WICG/local-network-access/pull/125

Summary

Add support for passing a targetAddressSpace option in the WebSocket constructor. This allows developers to specify that a WebSocket connection to a public hostname should be treated as going to a "local" or "loopback" destination, matching the existing support on the Fetch API. The main use case is to offer an escape hatch to bypass mixed content restrictions for connecting to local servers that cannot yet support HTTPS (as Local Network Access permissions require a secure context). Example: A public site that connects to a local server can use a hostname to avoid needing manual configuration of the exact private IP address in use: `const ws = new WebSocket("ws://local-server.example", { targetAddressSpace: "local"}` This will flag the WebSocket connection as going to a local address, bypassing mixed content blocking when run in a secure context. The user must grant the site the local network permission for the WebSocket connection to succeed, and the hostname must resolve to a local IP address (otherwise it will be blocked). This builds on https://chromestatus.com/feature/5080055102439424 which adds an options bag to the WebSocket constructor.

Blink component

Blink>Network>WebSockets

Web Feature ID

local-network-access

Motivation

To avoid mixed content blocking for local network WebSockets requests, web developers have relied on having their users manually configure their local network IP addresses, which is awkward at best. Adding support for the targetAddressSpace option in WebSockets aligns it with the Fetch API. This has also been requested by developers (e.g., https://github.com/WICG/local-network-access/issues/16#issuecomment-4459071272).

Initial public proposal

https://github.com/WICG/local-network-access/issues/126

Goals for experimentation

None

Requires code in //chrome?

False

Tracking bug

https://crbug.com/517413738

Estimated milestones

No milestones specified

Link to entry on the Chrome Platform Status

https://chromestatus.com/feature/4779920606756864?gate=6029507826941952

This intent message was generated by Chrome Platform Status.