[CASSANDRA-15862] Use "allow list" or "safe list" instead of the term "whitelist"

• Type: New Feature
• Status: Resolved
• Priority: Normal
• Resolution: Fixed
• Fix Version/s: 2.2.17, 3.0.21, 3.11.7, 4.0-beta1, 4.0
• Component/s: Legacy/Core
• Change Category: Code Clarity
• Complexity: Low Hanging Fruit
• Platform: All

Source Control Link

https://github.com/apache/cassandra/commit/c8c3c269bf1df944b73e2d4bf0008a6f412bf121

Test and Documentation Plan

Just CI for regressions

• Assignee: Sam Tunnicliffe
• Reporter: Ash Berlin-Taylor

Authors

Sam Tunnicliffe

Reviewers

Jordan West

• Created: 07/Jun/20 20:41
• Updated: 03/Jan/21 17:03
• Resolved: 12/Jun/20 10:40

Description

Language matters. I'd like to remove all references in Apache Airflow to whitelist or black list, and the Cassandra Python API has some that we can't easily remove.

The recent global events have made this even more relevant, but this has been on my radar for a while now. Here is a well written article for why I think it matters

https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/blog-post/terminology-its-not-black-and-white

It's fairly common to say whitelisting and blacklisting to describe desirable and undesirable things in cyber security.

However, there's an issue with the terminology. It only makes sense if you equate white with 'good, permitted, safe' and black with 'bad, dangerous, forbidden'. There are some obvious problems with this.

My exposure to is via the Python API where there is the cassandra.pollicies.WhiteListRoundRobinPolicy class. I propose that this be renamed to AllowListRoundRobinPolicy instead. I do not know if there are other references.