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Web Application Security consists of a myriad of security controls that ensure that a web application: Functions as expected. Cannot be exploited to operate out of bounds. Cannot initiate operations that it is not supposed to do. Web Applications have become ubiquitous after the expansion of Web 2.0, which Social Media Platforms, E-Commerce websites, and email clients saturating the internet spaces in recent years.  As the applications consume and store even more sensitive and comprehensive data, they become an ever more appealing target for attackers.  Common Attack Methods The three most common vulnerabilities that exist in this space are Injections (SQL, Remote Code), Cryptographic Failures (previously sensitive data exposure), and Broken Access Control (BAC). Today, we will focus on Injections and Broken Access Control.  Injections  SQL is the most common Database software that is used, and hosts a plethora of payment data, PII data, and internal busi...

Multiple security vulnerabilities have been discovered in the open-source Netgate pfSense firewall solution called pfSense that could be chained by an attacker to execute arbitrary commands on susceptible appliances. The issues relate to two reflected cross-site scripting ( XSS ) bugs and one command injection flaw, according to new findings from Sonar. "Security inside a local network is often more lax as network administrators trust their firewalls to protect them from remote attacks," security researcher Oskar Zeino-Mahmalat  said . "Potential attackers could have used the discovered vulnerabilities to spy on traffic or attack services inside the local network." Impacting pfSense CE 2.7.0 and below and pfSense Plus 23.05.1 and below, the shortcomings could be weaponized by tricking an authenticated pfSense user (i.e., an admin user) into clicking on a specially crafted URL, which contains an XSS payload that activates command injection. A brief description...

Google on Thursday announced that it will start testing a new feature called "Tracking Protection" beginning January 4, 2024, to 1% of Chrome users as part of its efforts to  deprecate third-party cookies  in the web browser. The setting is designed to limit "cross-site tracking by restricting website access to third-party cookies by default," Anthony Chavez, vice president of Privacy Sandbox at Google,  said . The tech giant noted that participants for Tracking Protection will be selected at random and that chosen users will be notified upon opening Chrome on either a desktop or an Android device. The goal is to restrict third-party cookies (also called "non-essential cookies") by default, preventing them from being used to track users as they move from one website to the other for serving personalized ads. While several major browsers like Apple Safari and Mozilla Firefox have either already placed  restrictions  on third-party cookies via features ...

A novel multi-platform threat called  NKAbuse  has been discovered using a decentralized, peer-to-peer network connectivity protocol known as  NKN  (short for New Kind of Network) as a communications channel. "The malware utilizes NKN technology for data exchange between peers, functioning as a potent implant, and equipped with both flooder and backdoor capabilities," Russian cybersecurity company Kaspersky  said  in a Thursday report. NKN, which has over 62,000 nodes, is  described  as a "software overlay network built on top of today's Internet that enables users to share unused bandwidth and earn token rewards." It incorporates a blockchain layer on top of the existing TCP/IP stack. While threat actors are known to take advantage of emerging communication protocols for command-and-control (C2) purposes and evade detection, NKAbuse leverages blockchain technology to conduct distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks and function as an imp...

Cybersecurity researchers have identified a set of 116 malicious packages on the Python Package Index (PyPI) repository that are designed to infect Windows and Linux systems with a custom backdoor. "In some cases, the final payload is a variant of the infamous  W4SP Stealer , or a simple clipboard monitor to steal cryptocurrency, or both," ESET researchers Marc-Etienne M.Léveillé and Rene Holt  said  in a report published earlier this week. The  packages  are estimated to have been downloaded over 10,000 times since May 2023. The threat actors behind the activity have been observed using three techniques to bundle malicious code into Python packages, namely via a test.py script, embedding PowerShell in setup.py file, and incorporating it in obfuscated form in the  __init__.py file . Irrespective of the method used, the end goal of the campaign is to compromise the targeted host with malware, primarily a backdoor capable of remote command execution, da...