XXE DoS and .Net
External XML Entity (XXE) vulnerabilities can be more than just a risk of remote code execution (RCE), information leakage, or server side request forgery (SSRF). A denial of service (DoS) attack is commonly overlooked. However, given a mis-configured XML parser, it may be possible for an attacker to cause a denial of service attack and block your application’s resources. This would limit the ability for a user to access the expected application when needed.
In most cases, the parser can be configured to just ignore any entities, by disabling DTD parsing. As a matter of fact, many of the common parsers do this by default. If the DTD is not processed, then even the denial of service risk should be removed.
For this post, I want to talk about if DTDs are parsed and focus specifically on the denial of service aspect. One of the properties that becomes important when working with .Net and XML is the MaxCharactersFromEntities property.
The purpose of this property is to limit how long the value of an entity can be. This is important because often times in a DoS attempt, the use of expanding entities can cause a very large request with very few actual lines of data. The following is an example of what a DoS attack might look like in an entity.
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <!DOCTYPE foo [ <!ELEMENT foo ANY > <!ENTITY dos 'dos' > <!ENTITY dos1 '&dos;&dos;&dos;&dos;&dos;&dos;&dos;&dos;&dos;&dos;&dos;&dos;' > <!ENTITY dos2 '&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;&dos1;' > <!ENTITY dos3 '&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;&dos2;' > <!ENTITY dos4 '&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;&dos3;' > <!ENTITY dos5 '&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;&dos4;' > <!ENTITY dos6 '&dos5;&dos5;&dos5;&dos5;&dos5;&dos5;&dos5;&dos5;&dos5;&dos5;&dos5;&dos5;' >]>
Notice in the above example we have multiple entities that each reference the previous one multiple times. This results in a very large string being created when dos6 is actually referenced in the XML code. This would probably not be large enough to actually cause a denial of service, but you can see how quickly this becomes a very large value.
To help protect the XML parser and the application the MaxCharactersFromEntities helps limit how large this expansion can get. Once it reaches the max amount, it will throw a System.XmlXmlException: ‘The input document has exceeded a limit set by MaxCharactersFromEntities’ exception.
The Microsoft documentation (linked above) states that the default value is 0. This means that it is undefined and there is no limit in place. Through my testing, it appears that this is true for ASP.Net Framework versions up to 4.5.1. In 4.5.2 and above, as well as .Net Core, the default value for this property is 10,000,000. This is most likely a small enough value to protect against denial of service with the XmlReader object.
Overview of Web Security Policies
Filed under: Development, Security, Testing
A vulnerability was just identified in your website. How would you know?
The process of vulnerability disclosure to an organization is often very difficult to identify. Whether you are offering any type of bounty for security bugs or not, it is important that there is a clear path for someone to notify you of a potential concern.
Unfortunately, the process is different on every application and it can be very difficult to find it. For someone that is just trying to help out, it can be very frustrating as well. Some websites may have a separate security page with contact information. Other sites may just have a security email address on the contact us page. Many sites don’t have any clear indication of how to report such a finding. Maybe we could just use the security@ email address for the organization, but do they have it configured?
In an effort to help standardize how to find this information, there is a draft definition for a method for web security policies. You can read the draft at https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-foudil-securitytxt-03. The goal of this is to specify a text file in a known path to provide contact information for users to submit potential security concerns.
How it works
The first step is to create a security.txt file to describe your web security policy. This file should be found in the .well-known directory (according to the specifications). This would make your text file found at /.well-known/security.txt. In some circumstances, it may also be found at just /security.txt.
The purpose of pinning down the name of the file and where it should be located is to limit the searching process. If someone finds an issue, they know where to go to find the right contact information or process.
The next step is to put the relevant information into the security.txt file. The draft documentation covers this in depth, but I want to give a quick example of what this may look like:
Security.txt
— Start of File —
# This is a sample security.txt file contact: mailto:james@developsec.com contact: tel:+1-904-638-5431 # Encryption - This links to my public PGP Key Encryption: https://www.jardinesoftware.com/jamesjardine-public.txt # Policy - Links to a policy page outlining what you are looking for Policy: https://www.jardinesoftware.com/security-policy # Acknowledgments - If you have a page that acknowledges users that have submitted a valid bug Acknowledgments: https://www.jardinesoftware.com/acknowledgments # Hiring - if you offer security related jobs, put the link to that page here Hiring: https://www.jardinesoftwarre.com/jobs # Signature - To help secure your file, create a signature file and reference it here. Signature: https://www.jardinesoftware.com/.well-known/security.txt.sig
—- End of File —
I included some comments in that sample above to show what each item is for. A key point is that very little policy information is actually included in the file, rather it is linked as a reference. For example, the PGP key is not actually embedded in the file, but instead the link to the key is referenced.
The goal of the file is to be in a well defined location and provide references to your different security policies and procedures.
WHAT DO YOU THINK?
So I am curious, what do you think about this technique? While it is still in draft status, it is an interesting concept. It allows providing a known path for organizations to follow to provide this type of information.
I don’t believe it is a requirement to create bug bounty programs, or even promote the security testing of your site without permission. However, it does at least provide a means to share your requests and provide information to someone that does find a flaw and wants to share that information with you.
Will we see this move forward, or do you think it will not catch on? If it is a good idea, what is the best way to raise the awareness of it?
The end of Request Validation
Filed under: Development, Security
One of the often overlooked features of ASP.Net applications was request validation. If you are a .Net web developer, you have probably seen this before. I have certainly covered it on multiple occasions on this site. The main goal: help reduce XSS type input from being supplied by the user. .Net Core has opted to not bring this feature along and has dropped it with no hope in sight.
Request Validation Limitations
Request validation was a nice to have.. a small extra layer of protection. It wasn’t fool proof and certainly had more limitations than originally expected. The biggest one was that it only supported the HTML context for cross-site scripting. Basically, it was trying to deter the submission of HTML tags or elements from end users. Cross-site scripting is context sensitive meaning that attribute, URL, Javascript, and CSS based contexts were not considered.
In addition, there have been identified bypasses for request validation over the years. For example, using unicode-wide characters and then storing the data ASCII format could allow bypassing the validation.
Input validation is only a part of the solution for cross-site scripting. The ultimate end-state is the use of output encoding of the data sent back to the browser. Why? Not all data is guaranteed to go through our expected inputs. Remember, we don’t trust the database.
False Sense of Security?
Some have argued that the feature did more harm than good. It created a false sense of security compared to what it could do. While I don’t completely agree with that, I have seen those examples. I have seen developers assume they were protected just because request validation was enabled. Unfortunately, this is a bad assumption based on a mis-understanding of the feature. The truth is that it is not a feature meant to stop all cross-site scripting. The goal was to create a way to provide some default input validation for a specific vulnerability. Maybe it was mis-understood. Maybe it was a great idea with impossible implementation. In either case, it was a small piece of the puzzle.
So What Now?
So moving forward with Core, request validation is out of the picture. There is nothing we can do about that from a framework perspective. Maybe we don’t have to. There may be people that create this same functionality in 3rd party packages. That may work, it may not. Now is our opportunity to make sure we understand the flaws and proper protection mechanisms. When it comes to Cross-site scripting, there are a lot of techniques we can use to reduce the risk. Obviously I rely on output encoding as the biggest and first step. There are also things like content security policy or other response headers that can help add layers of protection. I talk about a few of these options in my new course “Security Fundamentals for Application Teams“.
Remember that understanding your framework is critical in helping reduce security risks in your application. If you are making the switch to .Net core, keep in mind that not all the features you may be used to exist. Understand these changes so you don’t get bit.
Security Tips for Copy/Paste of Code From the Internet
Filed under: Development, Security
Developing applications has long involved using code snippets found through textbooks or on the Internet. Rather than re-invent the wheel, it makes sense to identify existing code that helps solve a problem. It may also help speed up the development time.
Years ago, maybe 12, I remember a co-worker that had a SQL Injection vulnerability in his application. The culprit, code copied from someone else. At the time, I explained that once you copy code into your application it is now your responsibility.
Here, 12 years later, I still see this type of occurrence. Using code snippets directly from the web in the application. In many of these cases there may be some form of security weakness. How often do we, as developers, really analyze and understand all the details of the code that we copy?
Here are a few tips when working with external code brought into your application.
Understand what it does
If you were looking for code snippets, you should have a good idea of what the code will do. Better yet, you probably have an understanding of what you think that code will do. How vigorously do you inspect it to make sure that is all it does. Maybe the code performs the specific task you were set out to complete, but what happens if there are other functions you weren’t even looking for. This may not be as much a concern with very small snippets. However, with larger sections of code, it could coverup other functionality. This doesn’t mean that the functionality is intentionally malicious. But undocumented, unintended functionality may open up risk to the application.
Change any passwords or secrets
Depending on the code that you are searching, there may be secrets within it. For example, encryption routines are common for being grabbed off the Internet. To be complete, they contain hard-coded IVs and keys. These should be changed when imported into your projects to something unique. This could also be the case for code that has passwords or other hard-coded values that may provide access to the system.
As I was writing this, I noticed a post about the RadAsyncUpload control regarding the defaults within it. While this is not code copy/pasted from the Internet, it highlights the need to understand the default configurations and that some values should be changed to help provide better protections.
Look for potential vulnerabilities
In addition to the above concerns, the code may have vulnerabilities in it. Imagine a snippet of code used to select data from a SQL database. What if that code passed your tests of accurately pulling the queries, but uses inline SQL and is vulnerable to SQL Injection. The same could happen for code vulnerable to Cross-Site Scripting or not checking proper authorization.
We have to do a better job of performing code reviews on these external snippets, just as we should be doing it on our custom written internal code. Finding snippets of code that perform our needed functionality can be a huge benefit, but we can’t just assume it is production ready. If you are using this type of code, take the time to understand it and review it for potential issues. Don’t stop at just verifying the functionality. Take steps to vet the code just as you would any other code within your application.
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