Archive for the ‘Security’ Category

Default Secure Google Search for Firefox, Chrome and IE

Posted by rajivvishwa On May - 25 - 2010

Google has launched Secure Google search hosted on SSL lately . This post talks on how to enable this Secure Google search to the browser search bar/search suggestions in Firefox, Chrome and IE browsers.

Updated: Added Screenshots for IE

1. Firefox

Go to the Mozilla Addons Page and add Google SSL Search Plugin

Google SSL Search in Firefox

Select ‘Start using it right away in the dialog box that displays – Add “Google SSL” to the list of engines available in the search bar?

Make Default in Firefox

2. Chrome

Right Click on Chrome Omnibar(Address bar) and Select ‘Edit Search Engines’.

Edit Search Engines in Chrome

In the Edit Search Engines Dialog box add https://www.google.com/search?q=%s in the URL field and click on Make Default Button.

Add Google SSL in Chrome

Dont forget to check the Chrome Extensions List for Security Testers, here (Internal Post)

3. Internet Explorer

Add Google SSL in IE

Click on the Install Button to see the following screen. Check the ‘Make this my default search provider’

Google SSL IE Add Screen

Now the Search box in IE will display Google.

Google SSL Installed in IE8



via Google Blog and TechDows




Jarlsberg – Vulnerable Web Application At Google Code

Posted by rajivvishwa On May - 18 - 2010

Jarlsberg is a vulnerable application which can be used to learn and understand web vulnerabilities. Detailed documentation is provided on the type of the vulnerabilities present in the application and ways to exploits it.

This codelab shows how web application vulnerabilities can be exploited and how to defend against these attacks. The best way to learn things is by doing, so you’ll get a chance to do some real penetration testing, actually exploiting a real application. Specifically, you’ll learn the following:

  • How an application can be attacked using common web security vulnerabilities, like cross-site scripting vulnerabilities (XSS) and cross-site request forgery (XSRF).
  • How to find, fix, and avoid these common vulnerabilities and other bugs that have a security impact, such as denial-of-service, information disclosure, or remote code execution.

Documentation Here

Jarlsberg - Hosted Vulnerable App

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13 Chrome Extensions for Security Testers

Posted by rajivvishwa On May - 17 - 2010

This post lists 13 Chrome Extensions to aid security testers during their web application pen testing.

1. WebDeveloper

Adds a toolbar button with various web developer tools. The official port of the Web Developer extension for Firefox. Internal post here.
WebDeveloper

2. Firebug Lite

Firebug Lite provides the rich visual representation we are used to see in Firebug when it comes to HTML elements, DOM elements, and Box Model shading
Firebug Lite

3. Pendule

This addon is similar to webdeveloper but not as powerful as it is. Internal Post here.
Pendule

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HTML5 CheatSheet Project

Posted by rajivvishwa On May - 14 - 2010

HTML5 is a new and upcoming technology which has enough features to introduce potential security issues if not properly implemented. A new project has been initiated in Google Code to keep developers updated on the security concerns to be kept in mind while developing their apps with HTML5.

Description of Project in Authors Terms,

This project is an attempt to create a well maintained, informative and categorized cheat sheet to highlight HTML5 as well as other client side and related security issues and ways to avoid them. The project is meant to target web developers as well as security researchers and especially browser vendors since many of the problems we found are based on faulty or quirky implementations. Focus is on completeness, comprehensibility and timeliness as well as continuity – benefits many other related cheat sheets don’t exactly provide.

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Disclosure of XSS Vulnerability in SharePoint 2007

Posted by rajivvishwa On May - 7 - 2010

An XSS vulnerability has been discovered and disclosed to public in SharePoint Server 2007 and Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. The vulnerability could allow an attacker to run arbitrary script that could result in elevation of privilege within the SharePoint site, as opposed to elevation of privilege within the workstation or server environment.

This vulnerability is discovered by High-Tech Bridge SA and has been notified to Microsoft 12 April 2010. On the day of writing of this post, the vulnerability remains unfixed.

Read HTBridge advisory here

Vulnerable URL :

http://TARGETSITE/_layouts/help.aspx?cid0=MS.WSS.manifest.xml%00%3Cscript%3Ealert%28%27XSS%27%29%3C/script%3E&tid=X

Screenshot

SharePoint 2007 XSS Vulnerability

Read more at Microsoft Security Advisory (983438)

As per PCI DSS, whenever a new version of OWASP Top 10 vulnerabilities are released, its implied that the current requirements are to be replaced with the latest OWASP updates. Current version of PCI-DSS was released in July 2009 and will include the new top 10 in the upcoming version.

Do check the post excel based OWASP testing checklist here

Implied PCI-DSS Requirement Changes

Req No Requirement DescriptionPCI 1.2 ReqOWASP 2007
6.5.1Injection
Injection flaws, such as SQL, OS, and LDAP injection, occur when untrusted data is sent to an interpreter as part of a command or query. The attacker’s hostile data can trick the interpreter into executing unintended commands or accessing unauthorized data.
6.5.2A2 - Injection Flaws
6.5.2Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
XSS flaws occur whenever an application takes untrusted data and sends it to a web browser without proper validation and escaping. XSS allows attackers to execute scripts in the victim’s browser which can hijack user sessions, deface web sites, or redirect the user to malicious sites.
6.5.1A1 –CrossSite Scripting (XSS)
6.5.3Broken Authentication and Session Management
Application functions related to authentication and session management are often not implemented correctly, allowing attackers to compromise passwords, keys, session tokens, or exploit other implementation flaws to assume other users’ identities.
6.5.7A7 –Broken Authentication and Session Management
6.5.4Insecure Direct Object References
A direct object reference occurs when a developer exposes a reference to an internal implementation object, such as a file, directory, or database key. Without an access control check or other protection, attackers can manipulate these references to access unauthorized data.
6.5.4A4 –Insecure Direct Object Reference
6.5.5Cross-Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
A CSRF attack forces a logged-on victim’s browser to send a forged HTTP request, including the victim’s session cookie and any other automatically included authentication information, to a vulnerable web application. This allows the attacker to force the victim’s browser to generate requests the vulnerable application thinks are legitimate requests from the victim.
6.5.5A5 –Cross Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
6.6.6Security Misconfiguration
Good security requires having a secure configuration defined and deployed for the application, frameworks, application server, web server, database server, and platform. All these settings should be defined, implemented, and maintained as many are not shipped with secure defaults. This includes keeping all software up to date, including all code libraries used by the application.
Not PresentNot Present
6.6.7Insecure Cryptographic Storage
Many web applications do not properly protect sensitive data, such as credit cards, SSNs, and authentication credentials, with appropriate encryption or hashing. Attackers may steal or modify such weakly protected data to conduct identity theft, credit card fraud, or other crimes.
6.5.8A8 –Insecure Cryptographic Storage
6.6.8Failure to Restrict URL Access
Many web applications check URL access rights before rendering protected links and buttons. However, applications need to perform similar access control checks each time these pages are accessed, or attackers will be able to forge URLs to access these hidden pages anyway.
6.5.10A10 –Failure to Restrict URL Access
6.6.9Insufficient Transport Layer Protection
Applications frequently fail to authenticate, encrypt, and protect the confidentiality and integrity of sensitive network traffic. When they do, they sometimes support weak algorithms, use expired or invalid certificates, or do not use them correctly.
6.5.9A9 –InsecureCommunications
6.6.10Unvalidated Redirects and Forwards
Web applications frequently redirect and forward users to other pages and websites, and use untrusted data to determine the destination pages. Without proper validation, attackers can redirect victims to phishing or malware sites, or use forwards to access unauthorized pages.
Not PresentNot Present

Grab a copy of OWASP Top 10 2010 here



Catch the Phish Before It Catches You!

Posted by rajivvishwa On May - 5 - 2010

Phishing techniques are becoming more popular and advanced that some phished sites seems visually challenging to be separated from its genuine counterpart.

Read this post about Indian Income Tax phishing site.

Take these Phishing quizzes to sharpen your skills to identify the fake sites.

1. Verisign’s – Phish No Phish

Phish No Phish

URL: https://www.phish-no-phish.com

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Running BackTrack Security Distro In VMWare

Posted by rajivvishwa On April - 12 - 2010

Backtrack is the most popularly used security distro used while during pentests. While we can partition our harddisk, install this OS and dual boot with our default OS; things can be made simpler by running BackTrack VM within our default OS. Using a security distro in a VM gives us few advantages like, portability & ability to quickly restore/duplicate the instances as required.

Running Backtrack

BackTrack4 VM can be downloaded from the backtrack site (link at the end of the post) and to run the VM, we need the free VMWare Player.

Install the VMWare Player and open the BT VM with it. We are good to go with the default configuration unless we have more RAM to spare (Its recommended to provide 512MB of RAM if you have around 2GB).

Adjust Backtrack VM RAM

Adjust Backtrack VM RAM

Default Credentials

Backtrack VM comes with the default login credentials (which can be changed later, ofcourse)

bt login:  root
Password:  toor
. . .
root@bt:~#  startx

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Googles SkipFish – Web App Security Scanner

Posted by rajivvishwa On April - 5 - 2010

Skipfish is an interactive sitemap for the targeted site by carrying out a recursive crawl and dictionary-based probes. The resulting map is then annotated with the output from a number of active (but hopefully non-disruptive) security checks. The final report generated by the tool is meant to serve as a foundation for professional web application security assessments.

Installation on Ubuntu/BackTrack (via Redspin)

Use the following commands in the terminal windows to install and run Skipfish. Replace OUTPUT_FOLDER and TARGETSITE with the domain name and the target’s URL respectively. Also change the wget URL to the URL of the latest version of Skipfish download available.

wget http://skipfish.googlecode.com/files/skipfish-1.29b.tgz
tar zxvf skipfish-1.01b.tgz
sudo apt-get install libidn11-dev
cd skipfish
make
cp dictionaries/default.wl skipfish.wl
./skipfish -o OUTPUT_FOLDER http://www.TARGETSITE.com

Trial Run

Installed SkipFish and ran on the target site, specs below.

Guest OS : BackTrack4 VM

Host OS : Windows Vista

RAM : 512MB

Application Size : Medium ( < 1000 Unique Pages )

Internet Speed : 1 MBPS

Skipfish Verbose

Skipfish displays the scan run statistics continuously during the run. Once the scan run is complete, we get to see the scan summary (shown in the below screenshot).

Skipfish Running

Skipfish Console (Click to Enlarge)


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Websecurify – Free Web Application Vulnerability Scanner

Posted by rajivvishwa On April - 2 - 2010

Websecurify is a powerful web application security testing environment designed from the ground up to provide the best combination of automatic and manual vulnerability testing technologies. This tool automatically identifies web application vulnerabilities by using advanced discovery and fuzzing technologies.

Wensecurify Scan in Progress

Websecurify Scan in Progress


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