Tag Archives: secure testing

Validation: Client vs. Server

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Years ago, I remember being on a technical interview phone call for a senior developer position. What stood out was when the interviewer asked me about performing input validation. The question was in regards to if validation should be on the client or the server. My answer: The server.

What took me by surprise was when the response was that my answer was incorrect. In fact, I was told that Microsoft recommends performing validation on the client. This was inaccurate information, but I let it go and continued with the interview.
Recently, I have been having more conversations around input validation. In particular, the question of client or server side. While it is easy to state that validation should always be performed on the server, lets dig into this a little more to better understand your situation.

From a pure security perspective, input validation must be performed on the server. There is one simple reason for this: Any protections built using client-side techniques can be bypassed by using a simple web proxy. Using JavaScript to enforce that a field contains an email address can be easily bypassed by intercepting the request and changing it after the JavaScript has executed.

If you look at the threat model of your application, requests from the client to the server cross a trust boundary. Because of this trust boundary we know that the data needs to be validated again. Why? There is no way to know what happened to the data before it was received. We can assume the request was sent from a browser, used by a typical user. However, we don’t know if the data was manipulated after leaving the browser, or even sent from a browser at all.

That, however, is from a strict security standpoint. We must not forget that client-side validation serves a purpose as well. While client-side validation may not be trusted by the server, it tends to be more focused on immediate feedback to the user. Not only does this save a round trip, or many round trips, to the server, it cuts down on the processing the server needs to handle.
If we take an example of purely validating required fields on a form, we can immediately see the benefit of client-side validation. Even a small form, if not complete can create a lot of inefficiency if the user is constantly posting it without all the required fields. The ability to alert to this on the client makes it much quicker and cuts down on the number of invalid requests to the server.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that the user can’t fill in all the required fields to pass the client-side validation, intercept the request, and then remove some of those fields. In this case, server-side validation would catch this. The goal, however, of client-side validation is to provide a reactive user interface that is fast.

Understanding how each validation location functions and what the real purpose is helps us identify when to use each. While server-side validation is always required, client-side validation can be a great addition to the application.

Application Security and Responsibility

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Who is responsible for application security within your organization? While this is something I don’t hear asked very often, when I look around the implied answer is the security team. This isn’t just limited to application security either. Look at network security. Who, in your organization, is responsible for network security? From my experience, the answer is still the security group. But is that how it should be? Is there a better way?

Security has spent a lot of effort to take and accept all of this responsibility. How often have you heard that security is the gate keeper to any production releases? Security has to test your application first. Security has to approve any vulnerabilities that may get accepted. Security has to ….

I won’t argue that the security group has a lot of responsibility when it comes to application security. However, they shouldn’t have all of it, or even a majority of it. If we take a step back for a moment, lets think about how applications are created. Applications are created by application teams which consist of app owners, business analysts, developers, testers, project managers, and business units. Yet, when there is a security risk with the application it is typically the security group under fire. The security group typically doesn’t have any ability to write or fix the application, and they shouldn’t. There is a separation, but are you sure you know where it is?

I have done a few presentations recently where I focus on getting application teams involved in security. I think it is important for organizations to think about this topic because for too long we have tried to separate the duties at the wrong spot.

The first thing I like to point out is that the application development teams are smart, really smart. They are creating complex business functions that drive most organizations. We need to harness this knowledge rather than trying to augment it with other people. You might find this surprising, but most application security tools have GUIs that anyone on your app dev teams can use with little experience. Yet, most organizations I have been into have the security group running the security tools (such as Veracode, Checkmarx, WhiteHat, Contrast, etc). This is an extra layer that just decreases the efficiency of the process.

By getting the right resources involved with some of these tools and tasks, it not only gets security closer to the source, but it also frees up the security team for other activities. Moving security into the development process increases efficiency. Rather than waiting on a scan by the security team, the app team can run the scans and get the results more quickly. Even better, they can build it into their integration process and most likely automate much of the work. This changes the security team to be reserved for the more complex security issues. It also makes the security team more scalable when they do not have to just manage tools.

I know what you are thinking.. But the application team doesn’t understand security. I will give it to you, in may organizations this is very true. But why? Here we have identified what the problem really is. Currently, security tries to throw tools at the issue and manage those tools. But the real problem is that we are not focusing on maturing the application teams. We attempt to separate security from the development lifecycle. I did a podcast on discussing current application security training for development teams.

Listen to the podcast on AppSec Training

Everyone has a responsibility for application security, but we need to put a bigger focus on the application teams and getting them involved. We cannot continue to just hurl statements about getting these teams involved over the fence. We say to implement security into the SDLC, but rarely are we defining these items. We say to educate the developers, but typically just provide offensive security testing training, 1-2 days a year. We are not taking the time to identify how they work, how their processes flow, etc. to determine how to address the problem.

Take a look at your program and really understand it. What are you currently doing? Who is performing what roles? What resources do you have and are you using them effectively? What type of training are you providing and is it effective regarding your goals?

James Jardine is the CEO and Principal Consultant at Jardine Software Inc. He has over 15 years of combined development and security experience. If you are interested in learning more about Jardine Software, you can reach him at james@jardinesoftware.com or @jardinesoftware on twitter.

Originally posted at https://www.jardinesoftware.com

Black Lists and White Lists: Overview

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I came across an interesting post on twitter the other day (https://twitter.com/suffert/status/567486188383379456) that depicts a sidewalk with a sign indicating what wasn’t allowed on the sidewalk. You have seen these before: NO bicycles, skateboards, rollerblades, roller skates, scooters. In the information technology sector, this is known as a black list; a list that defines what is NOT allowed or permitted. You can see black lists all over the place, input validation, output encoding, etc.

BLWL1

The other type of list that we are more commonly seeing is a white list; a list that defines what IS allowed indicating that everything else is NOT allowed. While writing this post I was drawing a blank on where I have seen thin in the physical world and it wasn’t until I was talking to a colleague about this that I realized I had the perfect example: Handicap parking. Handicap parking signs are meant to say that only people with that designation can park there and everyone else is prohibited. In technology, we are seeing it a lot more for input validation and output encoding because it is usually a smaller list compared to a black list. Lets compare the two and see what pros and cons exist.

PROTECTION
Honestly, they both provide good protection when properly defined. Depending on the data, a black list can actually be a strong control. For example, if we have a system that has special escape sequences to identify its control characters. While simplified down (and I know there are more characters than this) SQL uses the (‘) apostrophe as a control character. It is that delimiter to determine what is data and what is command. If SQL only had one control character (the apostrophe) then a black list would be sufficient. Put the apostrophe into the black list and any time that character appeared you could reject it, or escape it. Unfortunately, it is rare that the list will be that small. Using the example of SQL, what happens if in the future the update is released and now the (-) dash is a special character, or the (#) hashtag? Now the list has to be updated and re-deployed and during that time before deployment the application could be vulnerable.

A white list defines exactly what is good and puts everything else up for question. For this example lets take a first name field and look at input validation. If the field is defined as only (a-z) characters then it is easy to set up a white list using a regular expression to say only the letters (a-z) will be accepted. Every other character will be rejected. A regular expression for (a-z) is much simpler than trying to record every other character out there into the black list. What if you forget one? In this case you really don’t forget any because it is such a limited set. In the example I gave earlier with the handicap parking, the sign is simple: One designation that is allowed. What if the sign used a black list? Can you imagine the number of prohibited items there would be?

Another example is in output encoding to protect against HTML context cross-site scripting. I created a document a few years ago showing the different encoding methods in .NET (http://www.jardinesoftware.com/Documents/ASPNET_HTML_Encoding.pdf). Looking at this, there are five characters that are encoded using a black list build into .NET (<,>,”,&,’). This list defines what will get output encoded when using the HTMLEncode method. These are some of the most common characters used to perform cross-site scripting. What if a new character is found to be a problem? This method won’t cover it. With a white list we could say encode everything except for (a-z). Now if a new special character is determined to be a problem it is already encoded for us.

EFFECT ON USER
You wouldn’t expect much effect on the users if all you are doing is saying what is and isn’t allowed based on the use of the data. However, lets go back to the initial example that started all of this, the twitter post. Setting up the black list was most likely fairly simple. Here are some common problem items we see, lets just prohibit them. Of course then someone comes along on a unicycle and while probably shouldn’t be there, are not in violation of the sign. So it appears as a “Good Enough” solution that shouldn’t inhibit any valid users.

I posed the question on what the white list would look like. The first response I got back was “unassisted movement only” from a friend of mine, Tim Tomes.

BLWL2

Seems like a pretty good idea, I am not sure I would have thought of unassisted movement, but lets dig a little deeper. What about a wheelchair or crutches?

The point here is that with a white list, if it is too narrow, it could effect the ability for valid users to use the system. In this case, just using “unassisted movement only”, while a great first draft, would have prohibited anyone in a wheel chair from using the sidewalk. The point is that because a white list will prohibit anything in the list, it must be scrutinized and tested much more to ensure that it is exactly what is needed. Unlike a black list where there can be a control after the black list to continue limiting down items, if it is blocked by the white list there is no way to still have it later on.

CONCLUSION
I like both black lists and white lists and I believe they both have their place. It is important for you to analyze what your situation is to determine what the best course of action will be. In some cases a black list will be exactly what you are looking for, in others the white list will be the right fit. WE often get this feeling that we have to make blanket statements like “White lists are better so only use those.” Situations are different, the lists are different and you want to use the one that best fits your needs. Take a moment to determine what the pros and cons are to each and select the best fit.