We are using a secure application which uses https/ssl that claim the data is secure at rest. On the hosting server it is, safely locked away in a database. But I was wondering if on the client end does the web browser which caches the information also keep that information secure? What would stop me from accessing the web content from the local folder? Could you really make this claim on a web hosted solution?
SSL/TLS/HTTPS do not protect data at rest but only data during communication. And while the data might be locked away in a database on a server side they are accessible in plain there at least for some time, i.e. after TLS decryption and probably also for processing outside the database.
Data are also not protected by TLS at the client side. They are accessible in plain in the browser and they are stored in plain in the browsers cache - unless caching is explicitly disabled for these data. The details on how data from the cache can be accessed depends on the browser.
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I am creating an application, while working on its back-end I found that anyone can see my data while connected to server. I want to secure them. I tried many application which blocked the proxy connection like gmail and other big applications while I used them by turning on fiddler proxy they stopped me to connect to server by saying please remove proxy but when I used my application data via fiddler it showed all my data.
How can I check this?
You haven't specified what "applications" you're referring to (e.g. web pages vs. native apps on Android, etc), but in general you cannot detect Fiddler nor should you bother to try, as anything you do can be undone by a motivated attacker.
I'm building a serverless web application. My HTML, CSS and JavaScript are in a public storage location which my domain example.com points towards.
When my users navigate to my domain using their browser, their browser will GET these files from that location and then there is no further communication with example.com. The JavaScript application runs in the browser and communicates with a separate backend via HTTPS (in my case AWS, but could be e.g. Azure, Kinvey, BlueMix or others).
It therefore seems to be that there is no reason to encrypt the communication between my users' web browsers and xyz.com i.e. I don't need to provide https://example.com, and my doing so would provide no security benefit.
Am I correct?
The reason I ask is that I found at least two static hosting services which offer SSL support:
https://www.netlify.com/features#security
https://surge.sh/help/using-https-by-default
I am aware of the reasons for wanting HTTPS (described in the second link above and also at https://levels.io/default-to-https/ ...) but none of this seems to apply to my situation.
I believe this is a serious question because more applications will be built in this manner (the folks at http://serverlessconf.io/ certainly think so), and as long as the channel to the actual backend is secured there is no reason to secure the channel to what is essentially a read-only hard disk.
If you don't secure communication with example.com then a man in the middle attacker (eg a rogue wifi hotspot) could modify the html and JavaScript loaded by users.
One way to use this would be to change the JavaScript so that subsequent API requests are sent to attacker controller servers instead of yours, compromising any credentials or information transferred.
I have an Apache/2.2.15 web server with the modules, mod_shib, mod_ssl, and mod_jk. I have a virtual host which is configured (attached below) with AuthType Shibboleth, SSLCertificates, and JKMount to direct requests using AJP to my Tomcat 8 server after a session is successfully established with the correct IDP. When my http request reaches my app server, I can see the various Shib-* headers, along with the attributes my SP requested from the IDP.
Is there a way my app server can validate the shibsession cookie or other headers? I am trying to protect against the scenario where my web server, which resides in the DMZ is somehow compromised, and an attacker makes requests to my app server, which resides in an internal zone.
Is there a way I can validate a signature of something available in the headers, to guarantee that the contents did indeed originate from the IDP, and were not manufactured by an attacker who took control of my web server?
Is there something in the OpenSAML library I could use to achieve this?
Is there a way my app server can validate the shibsession cookie or other headers?
mod_shib has already done that difficult work for you. After validating the return of information from the Identity Provider (IdP), mod_shib then sets environment variables (cannot be set by the client) for your application to read and trust. Implementing OpenSAML in your application is unnecessary as mod_shib has done the validation work for you.
From the docs:
The safest mechanism, and the default for servers that allow for it,
is the use of environment variables. The term is somewhat generic
because environment variables don't necessarily always imply the
actual process environment in the traditional sense, since there's
often no separate process. It really refers to a set of controlled
data elements that the web server supplies to applications and that
cannot be manipulated in any way from outside the web server.
Specifically, the client has no say in them.
Anyone know how a web server (apache, tomcat) maintains sessions ?
I know how to create / handle and destroy sessions. What I need to know is how server maintains sessions internally.
i.e if 10 users are connected to the server, how the server identifies which session belongs to a particular user
Strictly speaking, your webserver (Apache) doesn't have a concept for "session"; it merely understands requests according to the HTTP protocol.
In fact, HTTP is famous for being a "stateless protocol" - there is no concept of "session". This is fundamental to the scalability of HTTP, but makes it hard to build web applications that need state.
So different web application frameworks have introduced the concept of "session".
Tomcat is not strictly speaking a web server, it's a servlet container.
Sessions are usually identified by a cookie with a unique ID for each user. The ID is generated and sent as a cookie when the session is first created (i.e. when the user doesn't already have a cookie).
Another way that's sometimes seen is keeping the session ID in the URL, which is used when the client refuses to accept cookies for some reason. This has numerous drawbacks though, such as security issues if the user pastes their URL to another user, having to add the ID to all links, and ugly URLs.
I am creating a secure web based API that uses HTTPS; however, if I allow the users to configure it (include sending password) using a query string will this also be secure or should I force it to be done via a POST?
Yes, it is. But using GET for sensitive data is a bad idea for several reasons:
Mostly HTTP referrer leakage (an external image in the target page might leak the password[1])
Password will be stored in server logs (which is obviously bad)
History caches in browsers
Therefore, even though Querystring is secured it's not recommended to transfer sensitive data over querystring.
[1] Although I need to note that RFC states that browser should not send referrers from HTTPS to HTTP. But that doesn't mean a bad 3rd party browser toolbar or an external image/flash from an HTTPS site won't leak it.
From a "sniff the network packet" point of view a GET request is safe, as the browser will first establish the secure connection and then send the request containing the GET parameters. But GET url's will be stored in the users browser history / autocomplete, which is not a good place to store e.g. password data in. Of course this only applies if you take the broader "Webservice" definition that might access the service from a browser, if you access it only from your custom application this should not be a problem.
So using post at least for password dialogs should be preferred. Also as pointed out in the link littlegeek posted a GET URL is more likely to be written to your server logs.
Yes, your query strings will be encrypted.
The reason behind is that query strings are part of the HTTP protocol which is an application layer protocol, while the security (SSL/TLS) part comes from the transport layer. The SSL connection is established first and then the query parameters (which belong to the HTTP protocol) are sent to the server.
When establishing an SSL connection, your client will perform the following steps in order. Suppose you're trying to log in to a site named example.com and want to send your credentials using query parameters. Your complete URL may look like the following:
https://example.com/login?username=alice&password=12345)
Your client (e.g., browser/mobile app) will first resolve your domain name example.com to an IP address (124.21.12.31) using a DNS request. When querying that information, only domain specific information is used, i.e., only example.com will be used.
Now, your client will try to connect to the server with the IP address 124.21.12.31 and will attempt to connect to port 443 (SSL service port not the default HTTP port 80).
Now, the server at example.com will send its certificates to your client.
Your client will verify the certificates and start exchanging a shared secret key for your session.
After successfully establishing a secure connection, only then will your query parameters be sent via the secure connection.
Therefore, you won't expose sensitive data. However, sending your credentials over an HTTPS session using this method is not the best way. You should go for a different approach.
Yes. The entire text of an HTTPS session is secured by SSL. That includes the query and the headers. In that respect, a POST and a GET would be exactly the same.
As to the security of your method, there's no real way to say without proper inspection.
SSL first connects to the host, so the host name and port number are transferred as clear text. When the host responds and the challenge succeeds, the client will encrypt the HTTP request with the actual URL (i.e. anything after the third slash) and and send it to the server.
There are several ways to break this security.
It is possible to configure a proxy to act as a "man in the middle". Basically, the browser sends the request to connect to the real server to the proxy. If the proxy is configured this way, it will connect via SSL to the real server but the browser will still talk to the proxy. So if an attacker can gain access of the proxy, he can see all the data that flows through it in clear text.
Your requests will also be visible in the browser history. Users might be tempted to bookmark the site. Some users have bookmark sync tools installed, so the password could end up on deli.ci.us or some other place.
Lastly, someone might have hacked your computer and installed a keyboard logger or a screen scraper (and a lot of Trojan Horse type viruses do). Since the password is visible directly on the screen (as opposed to "*" in a password dialog), this is another security hole.
Conclusion: When it comes to security, always rely on the beaten path. There is just too much that you don't know, won't think of and which will break your neck.
Yes, as long as no one is looking over your shoulder at the monitor.
I don't agree with the statement about [...] HTTP referrer leakage (an external image in the target page might leak the password) in Slough's response.
The HTTP 1.1 RFC explicitly states:
Clients SHOULD NOT include a Referer
header field in a (non-secure) HTTP
request if the referring page was
transferred with a secure protocol.
Anyway, server logs and browser history are more than sufficient reasons not to put sensitive data in the query string.
Yes, from the moment on you establish a HTTPS connection everyting is secure. The query string (GET) as the POST is sent over SSL.
You can send password as MD5 hash param with some salt added. Compare it on the server side for auth.