The websites and web applications are mission-critical business systems that must operate without security problems to process corporate confidential information. And to respect data protection standards, companies must consider web application penetration testing. There are statistical evidences supported by web application security testing companies which present that in countries like India, Dubai, Sri-lanka, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa; two out of three companies face cyber security threats.
Web application penetration testing consultants classify web app security risks by the type of attack. Using the type of attack as a base is the most common method used during web application penetration testing. Risk classification is very useful during the process and is of exceptional value to application developers, business executives, security professionals or any other entity interested in web application penetration testing. Application developers working in this field must learn about new threats, application layer attacks, web application penetration testing via web application security courses.
We are a cyber security company focused on web application security testing courses and services. Our web application security course focuses on independent methodologies for security review, secure programming guidelines, international standards, web application penetration testing, exploiting methods, and application-level attacks.
Below are some of the attacks that are covered by web application penetration testing services and courses:
Brute force
Brute Force is an automated trial and error attack, used to guess the values (user, password etc.) of the parameters of the web application/website. Usually people use weak passwords or cryptographic keys that are easy to guess. Hackers exploit this security vulnerability using a dictionary. Hackers loop through whole dictionary one word by one, searching for the valid password. According to web application penetration testing experts, the brute force attack is very popular and can take hours, weeks or years to complete. During our security testing course, you learn different methodologies of web application penetration testing, which can easily detect vulnerabilities related to brute force
Incomplete authentication & Weak validation
Incomplete authentication is an attack that occurs when a hacker accesses some confidential functionality of an application without complete authentication. In this attack a hacker could discover specific URL of the confidential functionality via brute forcing through common files and directory locations (/admin), error messages etc. Conventional applications are not secure, as most of the developers are not aware about techniques of web application security testing. In the scenario of a weak validation, the attacker can obtain, modify or retrieve data or passwords of other users. This occurs when the information required to validate the identity of users, is predictable and can be easily falsified. According to web application security testing consultants, the process of data validation is an important part of applications so businesses should make sure developers are aware of web application penetration testing. With the help of web application security testing services or security testing courses, companies can easily detect vulnerabilities related to incomplete authentication and weak validation.
Insufficient Authorization
Insufficient authorization means that an user has access to confidential parts of the application/website that should require elevated access control restrictions. Without any web application security testing measures, the attack of insufficient authorization could be very damaging. In the attack of insufficient authorization, an authenticated user could control the entire application or content of the website. As per the recommendations of web application security course, applications should have access policies, modification policies and prudent restrictions should guide the user activity within the application.
Session Hijacking
In a session hijacking attack a hacker could deduce or guess the session ID value and then can use that value to hijack another user’s session. If a hacker is able to guess the session ID of another user, fraudulent activity is possible. This could allow a hacker to use the back button of the browser to access the pages previously accessed by the victim. Apps without any web application security testing measures are susceptible to this attack. This vulnerability, which is commonly found during web application security testing, is incomplete session expiry. This results when a web app allows reuse of old session credentials. The incomplete expiration increases the exposure of the web app to hackers for stealing or hijacking a session.
Another vulnerability that leads to lots of attacks is session fixation and can easily of detected during our web application security testing. When a user’s session ID is forced to an explicit value, the hacker can exploit this to hijack the session. Later when the user session ID has been fixed, the hacker waits for the user to use it. When the user does so, the hacker uses this session ID value for session hijacking. The web pages that use cookie-based sessions are the first to be detected during a web application penetration testing
This attack could do a lot of damage to business reputation and hackers can steal confidential data, making web application penetration testing tools the first priority of any business. As per the recommendations of web application security course, logic for generating session ID, cookie and each session ID should be kept confidential. Companies can easily learn more about the best practices to prevent session hijacking and secure application programming during our web application security course.
Cross-site Scripting
When a user visits a website, the user expects security on the website and that the website will deliver valid content. Cross-site Scripting (XSS) is an attack where the victim is the user. In the XSS attack, the hacker forces a website to execute a code in the user’s browser. With this code the hacker has the ability to read, modify and transmit confidential data accessible by the browser. Without any web application penetration testing, it is difficult to detect this kind of vulnerability. This vulnerability allows a hacker to steal cookies, hijack sessions, open phishing sites, and download malware. According to web application security testing experts, there are two types of XSS attacks, persistent and non-persistent. Both attacks can cause a lot of damage to the reputation of the website. Our web application penetration testing tools and security testing course can easily help you to understand, detect and resolve vulnerabilities related to cross-site scripting (XSS).
Cross Site Request Forgery (CSRF)
The cross site request forgery (CSRF), also known as XSRF is an attack where the hacker can get the user to perform unwanted actions on remote domains. It is based on the idea of exploiting the persistence of sessions between browser tabs. Typically, most users do not terminate their website sessions and remain active while browsing other websites. By exploiting the vulnerability of XSRF a hacker can steal other website sessions. During a web application security testing, a Cross Site Request Forgery (CSRF) vulnerability can be detected easily as it is derived from XSS. Our security testing course focuses on how to detect and mitigate CSRF attacks via web application security testing.
Buffer Overflow
The buffer overflow is a very common vulnerability in software, which is when the data written to memory exceeds the reserved buffer size. According to web application penetration testing experts, during a buffer overflow attack the attacker exploits the vulnerability to alter the flow of an application and redirect the program to execute a malicious code. This vulnerability is very common at the operating system level or at an application level and can be detected via intensive web application penetration testing. Learning how to find buffer overflow attacks is somewhat complex as it is usually covered in depth during advance security testing courses.
SQL Injection
The SQL injection is a very common and dangerous attack. Many companies with no web application penetration testing processes in place are susceptible to this attack. This attack exploits the websites that use SQL as a database and construct SQL statements from user-supplied data. During the SQL injection attack, the hacker can easily modify an SQL statement and by exploiting this vulnerability, the hacker can gain full control over the database or even execute commands on the system. Using various web application penetration testing tools developers can detect this vulnerability and prevent it by sanitizing the data provided by the user. Software companies can make sure that developers are aware of different web application security testing techniques to secure their software from hackers.
Directory Indexing
In the directory indexing attack, an attacker can access all files in the directories on the server. This is equivalent to running a command “ls” or “dir” and showing the results in HTML format. The information in a directory may contain information that is confidential. In addition, a hacker can find confidential information in HTML comments, error messages and source code. During any web application security testing engagement, this vulnerability should be given high importance; as it can allow data leakage which can provide data to hackers to launch an advance attack.
Path Traversal
In the Path Traversal attack, a hacker access files, directories, and commands that reside outside the “root” directory of the website. With access to these directories, an attacker could have access to the important executable files that perform important functions and access to confidential information of users. In the path traversal attack a hacker can manipulate a URL so that the website will run or disclose the contents of files located anywhere on the web server. During our security testing course you can learn different web application security testing techniques for detecting and mitigating path traversal vulnerabilities.
Denial of Service
In a denial-of-service attack (DoS), the motive is to prevent a website/web application to function normally and serve normal user activity. DoS attacks try to utilize all available resources such as CPU, memory, disk space, bandwidth, etc. When these resources reach their maximum consumption, the web application will be inaccessible. According to web application penetration testing experts there are different types of DoS attacks, such as network level, the device level, application level and from different sources (DDoS). Normally during a web application security testing process, DDoS attacks are not done. However companies need to test their infrastructure capabilities and perform these attacks in a controlled environment with the help of web application security testing experts. Our security testing course focuses on different types of DDoS attacks and techniques for mitigating the same.
These are some of the attacks & vulnerabilities that are covered by our web application penetration testing services. Our services and courses can help to identify and resolve risks associated with web applications in your organization. Our web application security testing methodology is very different from traditional methodology of cyber security companies. Our web application security testing methodology is based on a process of manual and automated testing using our own scripts, code review, proprietary, commercial and open source tools that identify all types of vulnerabilities.
With research centers in Mexico, USA and India, International Institute of Cyber Security delivers web application penetration testing services, tools and security testing courses. We have a partner program that recognizes the effort and investment of strategic allies, offering online courses, classroom courses, services and tools to achieve sustainable and mutually beneficial business. Our partners / partners program is available in Australia, UK, Dubai, Sri-Lanka, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa.