What is OWASP?
The Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) is a global non-profit dedicated to improving the state of software security. While it’s most famous for its Top 10 list, it also develops a wide range of resources, including best practice guides, the OWASP Zed Attack Proxy (ZAP), and deliberately vulnerable systems designed to develop and test secure coding skills. OWASP also supports numerous local chapters and organizes conferences around the world.
In this article
What is the OWASP Top 10?
The OWASP Top 10 list is a list of the most significant web application security risks. It is updated every few years with the current list being released in 2021 and an update expected in 2025. The objective of this list is to educate developers and security professionals about these threats. In addition to explaining the issues, the list also provides guidance for avoiding, detecting, and remediating these vulnerabilities.
While the Top 10 list for web app vulnerabilities is the most well-known list, OWASP also maintains Top 10 lists for other systems. For example, its API Top 10 list highlights the most common issues in web APIs, which have some overlap with the main Top 10 list.
Designed to highlight the most critical vulnerabilities in web applications, the list is a mix of current threats — derived from analyzing production web applications for the most common vulnerabilities — and emerging risks identified via feedback from the developer and security communities.
#1. Broken Access Control
Broken access control vulnerabilities exist when a web application fails to properly restrict users’ access to sensitive data and functionality. For example, an application may fail to implement access controls, assign excessive permissions by default, or permit an attacker to escalate their privileges to act as an authenticated user or administrator.
#2. Cryptographic Failures
Cryptographic algorithms protect data from unauthorized access and malicious modification. Cryptographic failures include the failure to use cryptography when needed or misusing cryptographic components in a way that undermines their effectiveness and the security they provide. For example, a web application could transmit sensitive data in plaintext (HTTP), use weak or broken cryptographic algorithms, or use a weak source of randomness for generating cryptographic keys and similar data.
#3. Injection
Injection vulnerabilities can exist when a web application uses languages that intermingle user-provided data and instructions, such as SQL. If the application doesn’t validate, sanitize, or filter user-provided input before using it, malicious or malformed inputs could change the operation of a command. For example, SQL injection can be used to read, modify, or delete data in an SQL database, and command injection may permit the attacker to run terminal commands on the webserver.
#4. Insecure Design
Insecure design vulnerabilities deal with fundamental design failures in an application’s architecture where important security controls aren’t included. Some examples are including sensitive information in error messages, storing sensitive credential data in an insecure fashion, and violating trust boundaries within an application. Typically, these issues originate during the Planning and Design stages of the software development lifecycle, unlike other vulnerabilities that are errors that occur during the Development phase.
#5. Security Misconfiguration
Security misconfigurations exist in an application if it has been misconfigured or inadequately hardened against potential attacks. For example, an application may have unnecessary features enabled, use default or hardcoded passwords, or include excessive information within error messages and stack traces.
#6. Vulnerable and Outdated Components
Web applications commonly rely on third-party components and plugins. If these third-party components and dependencies are not kept up-to-date, they may contain exploitable vulnerabilities. This includes not only embedded components and direct dependencies but indirect dependencies as well, all the way down the software supply chain.
#7. Identification and Authentication Failures
Identification and authentication failures deal with a failure to properly validate a user’s identity. Examples of these vulnerabilities include allowing credential stuffing attacks, permitting weak or default passwords, and using insecure credential storage (plaintext, encrypted, or weakly hashed passwords). This differs from broken access control, which includes a failure to manage the access of a user whose identity has been successfully validated.
#8. Software and Data Integrity Failures
Software and data integrity failures were introduced in the 2021 list, and deal with implicitly trusting third-party data or code. For example, an application may use third-party components or plugins from untrusted sources, have an insecure CI/CD pipeline, or automatically install updates without verifying integrity and authenticity. Serialization vulnerabilities also fall under this vulnerability class.
#9. Security Logging and Monitoring Failures
Security logging and monitoring failures deal with including insufficient or sensitive data in log files. For example, an application may not properly log failed login attempts, which could leave the application vulnerable to credential stuffing attacks. Additionally, the organization may not properly monitor logs and events, causing them to overlook potential cyberattacks.
#10. Server-Side Request Forgery (SSRF)
Server-side request forgery (SSRF) vulnerabilities exist if a web application fetches a remote resource from a URL provided by the user without first validating that URL. This is problematic since it can allow an attacker to trick the application into performing malicious requests on its behalf. For example, an SSRF attack may allow an attacker to bypass a firewall or access control list (ACL) if the vulnerable application is permitted to make a request while the attacker’s device or account is not.
IONIX performs simulations of OWASP Top 10 attacks as part of its risk assessment
The vulnerabilities listed in the OWASP Top 10 have earned their place there as the most critical threats to web application security. This includes a mix of the most prevalent vulnerabilities in production web applications and the biggest emerging threats identified by the community.
Identifying and addressing OWASP Top 10 vulnerabilities is a critical component of a corporate web application security strategy since these are the threats most likely to be targeted and exploited by an attacker. For this reason, the IONIX platform automatically performs simulated attacks against all OWASP Top 10 vulnerabilities as part of its risk assessments for web applications.
The IONIX threat exposure management platform helps organizations gain visibility and control over their real attack surfaces via continuous attacker-centric threat monitoring and automated validation of identified security risks. To learn more about how IONIX can enhance your organization’s security posture, sign up for a free demo.