XSS Attacks Practical Examples ~ Cross Site Scripting Exploits

Cross Site Scripting, or XSS, is one of the most common type of vulnerabilities in web applications. XSS have been a part of the OWASP TOP 10 most critical web application ranking since its creation and were even at the top of the list in 2007. Cross Site Scripting vulnerabilities aim at injecting malicious content or functionality in websites, which affect the visitors or users of the website rather than the application itself directly. While the threat is known, the problem remains. For instance, in the fourth quarter of 2017, XSS still accounted for 8% of all web application attacks according to an Akamai report. In this first, brief introduction, we will look at what an XSS is, and some more significant examples of script based attacks.

XSS Attacks Practical Examples Cross Site Scripting Exploits

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Malicious cross-site scripting web vulnerabilities are very dangerous and can impact businesses through exfiltration of critical data leading to regulatory fines and damaged brand reputation. If XSS vulnerabilities go unnoticed it effects visitors every time they use the web page

Versions of the WP Mail WordPress plugin before 1.2 are vulnerable to areflected cross-site scripting (XSS) attack. The replyto parameter is notsufficiently sanitized, allowing JavaScript to be inserted in the URL.

Web applications can be attacked through a variety of vectors. Common types of web attacks include cross-site scripting, SQL injection, path traversal, local file inclusion and distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks.

Now that you have seen a demonstration of a stored cross-site scripting attack, some visual impact, and a mitigation technique, let's look at all of the mitigations techniques for preventing cross-site scripting (XSS attacks). A web application development team would review these mitigations techniques and implement them accordingly.

Output encoding is the primary defense against cross-site scripting vulnerabilities. It converts untrusted data into a secure form so the user can see the input without executing the code in the browser. You can protect your web application from various forms of cross-site scripting using HTML entity encoding of special characters before sending untrusted data into a browser. Typically, output encoding is done on the server-side.

Preventing cross-site scripting vulnerabilities requires that you perform SECURE code reviews, automated static testing during development, and dynamic testing once the web application is deployed. Furthermore, using secure coding practices will help prevent security vulnerabilities such as cross-site scripting.

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