Application Vulnerabilities Research Articles

VulPathsFinder: A Static Method for Finding Vulnerable Paths in PHP Applications Based on CPG

Today, as PHP application technology is becoming increasingly mature, the functions of modern multi-layer web applications are becoming more and more complete, and the complexity is also gradually increasing. While providing developers with various business functions and interfaces, multi-tier Web applications also successfully cover the details of application development. This type of web application adopts a unified entrance, many object-oriented codes are used, and features such as encapsulation, inheritance, and polymorphism bring challenges to vulnerability mining from the perspective of static analysis. A large amount of object-oriented code makes it impossible for a simple function name-matching method to build a complete call graph (CG), resulting in the inability to perform a comprehensive interprocedural analysis. At the same time, the encapsulation feature of the class makes the data hidden in the object attribute, and the vulnerability path cannot be obtained through the general data-flow analysis. In response to the above issues, we propose a vulnerability detection method that supports vulnerability detection for multi-layer web applications based on MVC (Model-View-Control) architecture. First, we improve the construction of the call graph and Code Property Graph (CPG). Then, based on the enhanced Code Property Graph, we propose a technique to support vulnerability detection for multi-layer web applications. Based on this approach, we implemented a prototype of VulPathsFinder, a security analysis tool extended from the PHP security analyzer Joern-PHP. Then, we select ten MVC based and ten non-MVC-based applications to form a test dataset and validate the effectiveness of VulPathsFinder based on this dataset. Experimental results show that, compared with currently available tools, VulPathsFinder can handle framework applications more effectively, build a complete code property map, and detect vulnerabilities in framework applications that existing tools cannot detect.

Web Application Vulnerabilities and Best Practices: A Comprehensive Analysis

Web applications are integral to our digital lives, but they are also prone to numerous security vulnerabilities that can lead to data breaches, unauthorized access, and other malicious activities. This research paper aims to provide a comprehensive analysis of common web application vulnerabilities and propose best practices for mitigating these risks. The study examines a wide range of vulnerabilities, including SQL injection, cross-site scripting (XSS), cross-site request forgery (CSRF), and insecure direct object references. By exploring real-world examples and conducting in-depth analysis, this research aims to raise awareness and provide practical recommendations for developers, security professionals, and organizations to enhance the security of their web applications.

SECURING IOT HEALTHCARE APPLICATIONS AND BLOCKCHAIN: ADDRESSING SECURITY ATTACKS

The Internet of Things (IoT) describes the connection of bodily devices as "things" that can communicate with other systems and devices through the Internet and exchange statistics (data or information), facilitating the exchange of data with other systems and devices. These devices have sensors, software, and various components designed to exchange data seamlessly within the IoT network. Securing and protecting the data transmitted over the Internet from unauthorized access is imperative to ensuring the integrity and confidentiality of the information. IoT Smart health monitoring systems, integral components of the IoT landscape, are susceptible to various attacks. These include denial of service (DoS), fingerprint, router, select, forwarding, sensor, and replay attacks, all of which pose significant threats to the security of these systems. As such, there is a pressing need to address and mitigate the vulnerabilities associated with IoT healthcare applications. This paper aims to explore the significant role of IoT devices in healthcare systems and provide an in-depth review of attacks that threaten the security of IoT healthcare applications. The study analyses the existing literature on the vulnerabilities present in smart health monitoring systems and the potential application of blockchain technology as a robust solution to enhance the security of IoT healthcare applications. This research reveals critical vulnerabilities in IoT healthcare applications and highlights blockchain's effectiveness in mitigating them, providing insights for robust security measures and strategic decision-making in secure healthcare systems. This paper provides valuable insight and recommendations for policymakers, researchers, and practitioners involved in the domain of the IoT healthcare system.

Identification and mitigation of the vulnerability of web applications in institutions of higher education

The security of information technology, specifically web applications, has become an area of concern today. Computer cybercrime is now a significant problem that affects more than just businesses and organizations. Higher education institutions also began to experience computer threats that revealed their information assets. Universities, polytechnics, colleges of education, research centers, and other postsecondary institutions are probably the most vulnerable because they house sensitive data on their faculty, staff, and students, as well as academic records of scientific and technological advancements and research. The first step in an information system security strategy is risk analysis management It helps in assessing the risk of information assets to know their security level or status, and assist in define a security control measures and implementation of technical plan to avoid threats that exploit some vulnerability that could cause severe damage to an asset or infrastructure of institutions higher education (IHEs). This article presents some recommendations to perform a risk analysis management in IHEs to accessed threats and vulnerability that helps to lower the risk of their information assets. This article presents existing educational threat and vulnerability on their web applications. Ensuring security is a goal of every organization regardless of its size or purpose and also proposed a risk management model. With the information technology, an organization may be considered secure when it ensures the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of information and IT assets. Confidentiality may be broken due to theft of sensitive information such as trade secrets, clients’ personal information.

N-Gram Tabanlı Tahmin Modeli ile XSS Saldırısı Algılama

The increment developments in technology has empowered the web applications. Meanwhile, the existence of Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities in web applications has become a concern for users. In spite of the numerous current detection approaches, attackers have been exploiting XSS vulnerabilities for years, causing harm to the internet users. In this paper, a text-mining based approach to detect XSS attacks in web applications is introduced. This approach is built to extract a set of features from a publicly available source code files, which are then used to build a prediction model. The findings include few comparisons between Word Tokenization and N-Gram in accuracy, time spend to build the model and AUC-ROC curve. The results show that N-Gram tokenization outperforms the Word Tokenization.

DDoS: Distributed denial of service attack in communication standard vulnerabilities in smart grid applications and cyber security with recent developments

Smart grid system is evident with control technologies and digital communications systems. The cyber–physical system is a critical infrastructure connected with complex drives and devices. The modern smart grid’s prominent communication standard adopts high scalability, supports numerous communication devices’ input/outputs, and has multi-vendor interoperability. Cyber-attack leads to an unstable power grid system and enormous economic loss. Throughout different cyber-attack, distributed denial of service attack is mostly destructive to smart grid infrastructure. This paper investigates smart grid cyber security systems and the communication vulnerabilities of other communication protocols. A comprehensive study on distributed denial of service attack techniques and detection approaches is present. Finally, examine a new hybrid machine learning-based distributed denial of service attack detection technique for a sustainable smart grid system.

Detecting and Preventing Common Web Application Vulnerabilities: A Comprehensive Approach

Web applications are becoming very important in our lives as many sensitive processes depend on them. Therefore, it is critical for safety and invulnerability against malicious attacks. Most studies focus on ways to detect these attacks individually. In this study, we develop a new vulnerability system to detect and prevent vulnerabilities in web applications. It has multiple functions to deal with some recurring vulnerabilities. The proposed system provided the detection and prevention of four types of vulnerabilities, including SQL injection, cross-site scripting attacks, remote code execution, and fingerprinting of backend technologies. We investigated the way worked for every type of vulnerability; then the process of detecting each type of vulnerability; finally, we provided prevention for each type of vulnerability. Which achieved three goals: reduce testing costs, increase efficiency, and safety. The proposed system has been validated through a practical application on a website, and experimental results demonstrate its effectiveness in detecting and preventing security threats. Our study contributes to the field of security by presenting an innovative approach to addressing security concerns, and our results highlight the importance of implementing advanced detection and prevention methods to protect against potential cyberattacks. The significance and research value of this survey lies in its potential to enhance the security of online systems and reduce the risk of data breaches.

Harbinger: A Toolkit for Vulnerability Testing of IoT Devices and Web Clients

Abstract: The need for efficient tools to identify and mitigate vulnerabilities has never been more critical due to the complexity and proliferation of online applications and embedded systems. We introduce a Python toolkit in this study that combines a variety of security testing and analysis methodologies, allowing users to locate and fix web application vulnerabilities and examine firmware files. Our toolkit offers aggregated reports summarizing the outcomes of firmware analysis and web application vulnerability testing, in addition to being adaptable and user-friendly so customers may change and add features to meet their unique needs. We provide the findings from testing and analysis carried out on a variety of online apps and firmware files, as well as the design and implementation of our tools. The integration of additional security testing tools, compatibility for other file formats, and the introduction of machine learning-based analysis are just a few of the future directions we could take our toolset. This Python toolkit makes a significant addition to the realm of cybersecurity by offering customers a strong and adaptable solution for web application vulnerability testing and firmware analysis.

Analysis of vulnerabilities and security problems of web applications

The article provides a comprehensive analysis of vulnerabilities, methods, tools and problems faced by web application security testing. The analysis of scientific research in the field of web application security testing revealed a significant interest of scientists in finding effective ways to minimize site security risks and vulnerabilities. It was found out that the list of the most common web application vulnerabilities includes: broken access control, cryptographic failures, misconfiguration of security, SQL and other injections, insecure design, identification and authentication errors, etc. Specific features of the security vulnerabilities of web applications are highlighted. The problems faced by automated tools for web security testing are separately considered, namely the development of automated tools for web security testing, the use of RIA (Rich Internet Application) web applications, and the use of insecure cryptographic storage. Web application security risks can be associated with the design phase, the development phase, the deployment phase, and the maintenance phase. It is security testing that is used to identify these risks of the web application, to investigate the vulnerabilities and weak points of the web application. The conducted analysis of security vulnerabilities, methods and problems of testing web applications revealed the presence of different approaches to protect software products. A combination of manual and automated web application security testing techniques is advisable, starting with automated security testing and complementing it with manual penetration testing. A comprehensive approach should integrate testing into all stages of the software development life cycle. Such approach helps to use the most appropriate and effective available methods for the current phase of software product development.

Adaptive modeling for security vulnerability propagation to predict the impact of business process redesign

Background: Business process redesign (BPR) is typical in organizations and is followed by adaptive maintenance on supporting applications. However, BPR leads to information security vulnerabilities that can propagate to its supporting applications. Methods: This study proposes a new method called Node Strength-based Vulnerability Modeling (NSVM) for modeling security vulnerability propagation in the business processes and IT service layers. We applied the concept of social network strength to build our propagation model. The propagation model is needed to predict the impact of BPR on application vulnerabilities. We chose e-commerce applications as a case study. We evaluated the vulnerability propagation model by comparing the predicted vulnerability scores from the model with the actual scores of e-commerce applications in the National Vulnerability Database. Results: Our experimentation indicates that the propagation strength between nodes is influenced by Common Weakness Enumerations (CWEs) between them. Thus, the vulnerability propagation model can predict vulnerability scores at module nodes in the IT service layer. In the NSVM, the best prediction scores were obtained by aggregating the adjacency and initial scores using the maximum principle approach. The best evaluation results yield mean absolute error (MAE), root mean squared error (RMSE), and mean squared error (MSE) scores of 0.60, 1.44, and 1.16, respectively. Conclusion: Our study shows that the vulnerability propagation model with an adaptive mechanism based on BPR can be used to predict security vulnerability scores as the impact of business process redesign.

Data Integrity Verification in Cloud Computing

High security is one of the major obstacles for opening up the new era of the long dreamed vision of Cloud computing as a utility. In today’s trend of cloud computing, all the sensitive applications and data are moved towards cloud infrastructure and data center that run on virtual computing resources in the form of virtual machine. These attributes poses many security challenges such as accessibility vulnerabilities, virtualization vulnerabilities and web application vulnerabilities. We primarily aim to achieve better data integrity verification technique for Data Storage as a Service (Daas) in cloud computing and help users to recognize the threats associated with their uses.

Automated Security Assessments of Amazon Web Services Environments

Migrating enterprises and business capabilities to cloud platforms like Amazon Web Services (AWS) has become increasingly common. However, securing cloud operations, especially at large scales, can quickly become intractable. Customer-side issues such as service misconfigurations, data breaches, and insecure changes are prevalent. Furthermore, cloud-specific tactics and techniques paired with application vulnerabilities create a large and complex search space. Various solutions and modeling languages for cloud security assessments exist. However, no single one appeared sufficiently cloud-centered and holistic. Many also did not account for tactical security dimensions. This article, therefore, presents a domain-specific modeling language for AWS environments. When used to model AWS environments, manually or automatically, the language automatically constructs and traverses attack graphs to assess security. Assessments, therefore, require minimal security expertise from the user. The modeling language was primarily tested on four third-party AWS environments through securiCAD Vanguard, a commercial tool built around the AWS modeling language. The language was validated further by measuring performance on models provided by anonymous end users and a comparison with a similar open source assessment tool. As of March 2020, the modeling language could represent essential AWS structures, cloud tactics, and threats. However, the tests highlighted certain shortcomings. Data collection steps, such as planted credentials, and some missing tactics were obvious. Nevertheless, the issues covered by the DSL were already reminiscent of common issues with real-world precedents. Future additions to attacker tactics and addressing data collection should yield considerable improvements.

A Survey on Web Application Penetration Testing

Websites are becoming increasingly effective communication tools. Nevertheless, web applications are vulnerable to attack and can give attackers access to sensitive information or unauthorized access to accounts. The number of vulnerabilities in web applications has increased dramatically over the past decade. Many are due to improper validation and sanitization of input. Identifying these vulnerabilities is essential for developing high-quality, secure web applications. Whenever a website is released to the public, it is required to have had penetration testing to a certain standard to ensure the security of the information. Application-level security vulnerability detection is possible for many commercial and open-source applications. However, developers are curious about which tools detect security vulnerabilities and how quickly they do so. The purpose of this study is to discuss penetration testing and how it can be implemented. This paper also explores the hazards and vulnerabilities associated with the web environment as well as the protective measures that can be taken. In addition, a comprehensive review and comparison of common web penetration testing tools is provided. The aim of this paper is to help web penetration testers choose a technology that is optimal for their requirements. The paper also sets out to guide and provide recommendations to users for choosing the best web penetration test tool and increasing their awareness of secure web environments. The study results indicate that not all web penetration testing tools offer the same features and that combining analysis tools can provide detailed information about web vulnerabilities.

Exploring the Effectiveness of Web Crawlers in Detecting Security Vulnerabilities in Computer Software Applications

Exploring the Effectiveness of Web Crawlers in Detecting Security Vulnerabilities in Computer Software Applications

Security Analysis of Simpel Desa using Mobile Security Framework and ISO 27002:2013

The Personal Identification Number or KTP is prone to be stolen and used by unwanted parties, this is also a possibility for the Simpel Desa, a village administration application that also contain and use the Personal Identification Number. This study aims to detect information security vulnerabilities. This study aims to analyze security vulnerabilities in applications using MobSF and ISO 27002:2013. MobSF is used for penetration testing for malware in applications. In MobSF the Simpel Desa application is analyzed in two ways, namely static and dynamic. ISO 27002:2013 is used to map the findings of vulnerabilities and potential misuse of information so that they get accurate analysis results. The control used is domain 9 (access control) and 10 (cryptography). The results obtained in the static analysis found the existence of vulnerabilities in aspects of cryptography and permission access. The dynamic analysis found that Root Detection and Debugger Check Bypass had not been implemented. Overall, based on ISO 27002:2013 information security has not been maximally implemented. The recommendations given focus on the aspects of application permissions and access rights, user authentication, and the implementation of information security.

Automatic Vulnerability Detection in Tizen Applications with Dynamic Symbolic Execution

Security of Internet-of-Things (IoT) systems is important due to their widespread usage in everyday life. Much research has been performed on analyzing the security of IoT communication protocols and operating systems. However, few studies have focused on analyzing the security of IoT applications and automatic detection of vulnerabilities in them. In these studies, the code of IoT applications and operating systems are analyzed statically to detect vulnerabilities. To the best of our knowledge, there is no dynamic analysis solution suggested for vulnerability detection in such applications, although this method is more accurate than static analysis. In fact, IoT applications are executed in special-purpose hardware, which makes their dynamic analysis more difficult than ordinary applications. In this paper, we propose a technical solution that combines static and dynamic analysis methods to automatically detect vulnerability in applications of Tizen IoT operating system. We consider Native and Web Tizen applications and present an automatic vulnerability detection method for each type of application. Our focus is on detecting buffer overflow and XSS vulnerability classes in Native and Web applications, respectively. We have evaluated the effectiveness of our method using a group of native and web test programs. The results of our experiments show that our solution is able to detect the vulnerability in these programs effectively.

Scanner++: Enhanced Vulnerability Detection of Web Applications with Attack Intent Synchronization

Scanners are commonly applied for detecting vulnerabilities in web applications. Various scanners with different strategies are widely in use, but their performance is challenged by the increasing diversity of target applications that have more complex attack surfaces (i.e., website paths) and covert vulnerabilities that can only be exploited by more sophisticated attack vectors (i.e., payloads). In this paper, we propose Scanner++, a framework that improves web vulnerability detection of existing scanners through combining their capabilities with attack intent synchronization. We design Scanner++ as a proxy-based architecture while using a package-based intent synchronization approach. Scanner++ first uses a purification mechanism to aggregate and refine attack intents, consisting of attack surfaces and attack vectors extracted from the base scanners’ request packets. Then, Scanner++ uses a runtime intent synchronization mechanism to select relevant attack intents according to the scanners’ detection spots to guide their scanning process. Consequently, base scanners can expand their attack surfaces, generate more diverse attack vectors and achieve better vulnerability detection performance. For evaluation, we implemented and integrated Scanner++ together with four widely used scanners, BurpSuite, AWVS, Arachni, and ZAP, testing it on ten benchmark web applications and three well-tested real-world web applications of a critical financial platform from our industry partner. Working under the Scanner++ framework helps BurpSuite, AWVS, Arachni, and ZAP cover 15.26%, 37.14%, 59.21%, 68.54% more pages, construct 12.95×, 1.13×, 15.03×, 52.66× more attack packets, and discover 77, 55, 77, 176 more bugs, respectively. Furthermore, Scanner++ detected eight serious previously unknown vulnerabilities on real-world applications, while the base scanners only found three of them.

Pengujian Perangkat Lunak Menggunakan Metode Regression Testing pada Aplikasi Pembelajaran Matematika untuk Siswa Tingkat Smp Berbasis Android

Technological developments have caused several significant changes in the world of education. One of them is as a learning media. Currently, students at every level of education are familiar with the use of devices as learning media. Through technology, it is easier for them to access every material so that it is easier to learn it. As a result, learning media applications that can be used in students' mobile devices to facilitate their activities are increasingly being loved lately. However, applications with various features and advantages will certainly leave gaps in application vulnerabilities and other errors. Therefore, this study aims to determine the readiness of the application when used in bulk and minimize errors that occur to maintain the integrity of the application so that it can be used properly by users using the Regression Testing method. In this study the application used was the Mathematics Learning Application for Android-Based Middle School Level Students.

Pengujian Perangkat Lunak Menggunakan Metode Regression Testing pada Aplikasi Pembelajaran Matematika untuk Siswa Tingkat Smp Berbasis Android

Technological developments have caused several significant changes in the world of education. One of them is as a learning media. Currently, students at every level of education are familiar with the use of devices as learning media. Through technology, it is easier for them to access every material so that it is easier to learn it. As a result, learning media applications that can be used in students' mobile devices to facilitate their activities are increasingly being loved lately. However, applications with various features and advantages will certainly leave gaps in application vulnerabilities and other errors. Therefore, this study aims to determine the readiness of the application when used in bulk and minimize errors that occur to maintain the integrity of the application so that it can be used properly by users using the Regression Testing method. In this study the application used was the Mathematics Learning Application for Android-Based Middle School Level Students.

Systematic Review of Common Web-Application Vulnerabilities

Organizations are increasingly worried about web application vulnerabilities because they can be used by cybercriminals to access private data without authorization. In this review, we examine the current state of the vulnerabilities in the web application layer. We begin by discussing the different types of vulnerabilities that can affect web applications, including cross-site scripting (XSS), brute force, SQL injection, and cross-site request forgery (CSRF) attacks. And then for each vulnerability, we discuss the various approaches that have been developed to detect and prevent these vulnerabilities. Finally, we discuss the challenges and limitations of current approaches and suggest directions for future research. Key Words: web application, vulnerabilities, cyber-security, SQL injection, XSS, CSRF.