SAML, developed by the Security Services Technical Committee of the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS), is an XML-based framework for communicating user authentication, entitlement, and attribute information. As its name suggests, SAML allows business entities to make assertions regarding the identity, attributes, and entitlements of a subject (an entity that is often a human user) to other entities, such as a partner company or another enterprise application.
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Web sites today face many threats to the confidentiality and integrity of the data used and the functionality provided by the application. This problem is compounded by the fact that Web developers are simply lack of either adequate knowledge and skills in writing secure Web application codes (Huang et al., 2005) or sufficient testing methodologies for the audit and control of Web development (Mansouir and Houri, 2006). Works in the design and implementation of security measures for Web applications are greatly in need.
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Although traditional firewalls have effectively prevented network-level attacks, most future attacks will be at the application level, where current security mechanisms are woefully inadequate. Application-level security vulnerabilities are inherent in a Web application’s code, regardless of the technology in which the application is implemented or the security of the Web server and backend database on which it is built. A recent advisory published by Internet Security Systems (see the “Internet Resources” sidebar, p. 44) claims that 11 widely deployed shopping cart applications are vulnerable to a simple attack that lets hackers pur- chase goods for much less than their listed price. Worryingly, the attack does not require particular technical skill; it suffices to save the shopping cart’s HTML confirmation form to disk, use a text editor to modify the price of the goods (stored in a hidden form field), and load the HTML form back into the browser.
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Information and communication technologies continue to pervade our lives in various aspects which include health, education, entertainment and ecommerce. People need to be able to trust computer systems as the dependence on them increases. The Trustworthy Computing vision (CRA, 2003) refers to computer systems that are intuitive, controllable, reliable and predictable and that ensure availability and security. Secure cod- ing is not trivial and poor code security management may leave the developed web application vulnerable to attack or turn the application into a launch pad for serious attacks.
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The following document is intended as a guideline for developing secure web-based applications. It is not about how to configure firewalls, intrusion detection, DMZ or how to resist DDoS attacks. This is a task best addressed at system and network level. However, there is little material available today intended for developers. We have entered the dotcom age in which a web site is no longer an isolated site, but an extension of the internal business systems, yet there isn’t much about how to create this extension securely.
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E-commerce, pay-per-use online services, user-authentication and tracking for e-learning, online gaming, contests… What do all of these applications have in common? The need for secure transfer of encrypted data between client workstations and server applications. According to a study by Gartner Consulting, the growing concern for Internet security parallels the evolution of e-business. In the earliest days of Internet development, the emphasis was on distributing content over the web and making it available to anyone. Now, as the Internet matures, clients are more concerned with ensuring that their assets, both monetary and intellectual, are protected from those who may commit fraud or abuse them. This is why more and more developers have been looking for security solutions.
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Most Internet servers sit behind firewalls and use detection scripts to send alerts when break?ins are attempted. Some system administrators even run software to detect portscanners and denial?of?service attempts. However, many system administrators still overlook security problems in CGI scripts and web applications.
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The rise of the software-as-a-service paradigm has led to the development of a new breed of sophisticated, interactive applications often called Web 2.0. While web applications have become larger and more complex, web application developers today have little visibility into the end-to-end behavior of their systems.
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