Stoic Philosophy for Modern Security
"You have power over your mind - not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength."
- Marcus Aurelius
Around 300 BCE, a merchant named Zeno was shipwrecked near Athens. Having lost everything, he wandered into a bookshop and discovered Socratic philosophy. This chance encounter led him to found Stoicism - a philosophy that would influence emperors, shape Western thought, and remain relevant for over two millennia.
Zeno taught in the Stoa Poikile (Painted Porch) in Athens, giving Stoicism its name. His core insight was simple but profound: we cannot control external events, but we can master our responses to them. Focus only on what is within your control.
Zeno's birthplace, Citium (modern-day Larnaca, Cyprus), was a strategic port city that served as a gateway between civilizations. For over a thousand years, it connected the Greek world with Persia, Egypt, and the Levant - a single point where diverse cultures, identities, and empires converged.
ZenoAuth embodies this concept: a single, logical gateway where all your identity systems converge securely. Like ancient Citium, we provide the controlled passage point between your users and your systems.
"You can't control the threats. You can control the gate."
In cybersecurity, threats are infinite and ever-evolving. Trying to predict and prevent every attack is futile. Instead, ZenoAuth focuses on what we can control: the authentication gateway. By making the gate impenetrable, we achieve security regardless of external threats.
"Security through reason, not paranoia."
Fear-driven security creates complexity, exceptions, and vulnerabilities. Logical security is simple, consistent, and verifiable. Every decision in ZenoAuth is based on mathematical certainty and rational analysis - not vendor FUD or compliance theater.
"Complexity is the enemy of security."
The Stoics valued simplicity and self-sufficiency. ZenoAuth requires only PostgreSQL - no Redis, no message queues, no external services. Fewer moving parts mean fewer failure points, simpler operations, and a smaller attack surface.
"First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do."
- Epictetus
We set out to be the simplest, most logical identity solution. Every decision flows from that intention.
"Waste no more time arguing about what a good man should be. Be one."
- Marcus Aurelius
Less talk about security, more actual security. Code speaks louder than marketing.
"He who fears death will never do anything worth of a man who is alive."
- Seneca
Security through paranoia leads to unusable systems. Rational security enables business.
Every external dependency is a potential point of failure and attack vector. PostgreSQL is our only requirement because it's battle-tested, well-understood, and already in most infrastructure stacks.
When in doubt, deny. Errors should never grant access. Timeouts should reject. The secure path must be the default path, requiring explicit action to reduce security.
Security through obscurity is no security at all. Open source code, comprehensive audit logs, and clear documentation. If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.
OAuth 2.0, OpenID Connect, SCIM, JWT - we implement standards, not proprietary protocols. Standards have been reviewed by many eyes, tested in production, and integrate with existing tooling.
Rust eliminates entire categories of vulnerabilities - buffer overflows, use-after-free, data races. The compiler catches what humans miss. This isn't preference; it's logic.
Every authentication, every admin action, every configuration change is logged. You can't improve what you don't measure, and you can't investigate what you didn't record.
Join organizations that choose reason over fear, simplicity over complexity, and control over chaos.