[BUG]: RBAC Issue – Non-Platform Admin Users Cannot Access Private Tools Despite platform_admin Role

[vksinha10]

Description

We are observing inconsistent RBAC behavior in Context Forge related to visibility of private MCP tools and gateways.

Working Scenario
When logging in with the configured platform admin user (PLATFORM_ADMIN_EMAIL, e.g., admin@admin.com):
Able to view all private tools and gateways ✅
Full access works as expected
Problem Scenario
We created a new user via API:
POST /auth/email/admin/users
User details:
is_admin: true
Assigned to a team (dev team)
Given platform_admin role
Verified team membership via UI
After logging in via UI:
User can only see public tools
Cannot see private tools or gateways ❌
Expected Behavior

Any user with:

is_admin: true
platform_admin role

should have admin bypass visibility, equivalent to PLATFORM_ADMIN_EMAIL.

Actual Behavior

Only the bootstrap admin (PLATFORM_ADMIN_EMAIL) gets full visibility.
Other users with identical roles do not

[bogdanmariusc10]

Thank you for the report, @vksinha10 ! I've investigated the codebase and can confirm this is a legitimate bug in the admin bypass logic.

Root Cause

The issue is in mcpgateway/services/base_service.py (lines 85-86). The admin bypass condition requires both user_email=None AND token_teams=None:

if user_email is None and token_teams is None:
    return query  # Admin bypass - no filtering

However, when a user with is_admin=True logs in via the UI:

1. Their email is populated in the JWT token
2. The auth flow resolves teams from the database for session tokens
3. Even with is_admin=True, user_email is not None (it's their actual email address)
4. Therefore, the bypass condition fails and visibility filtering is applied

Why Bootstrap Admin Works

The bootstrap admin (PLATFORM_ADMIN_EMAIL) gets special treatment in mcpgateway/services/permission_service.py (lines 666-668):

# Special case for platform admin (virtual user)
if user_email == getattr(settings, "platform_admin_email", ""):
    return True

But this special case doesn't extend to the visibility filtering layer.

The Inconsistency

ContextForge's two-layer security model is inconsistent for admin users:

• Layer 2 (RBAC): Admin users with is_admin=True get permission bypass ✅
• Layer 1 (Token Scoping/Visibility): Only bypasses when user_email=None AND token_teams=None ❌

This means admin users can perform actions (Layer 2 passes) but can't see the resources to act on (Layer 1 blocks).

Solution

The _apply_access_control() method needs to check the is_admin flag from the database and grant visibility bypass accordingly, aligning Layer 1 with Layer 2 behavior.

I'll a create a PR for this.