CSC/ECE 517 Fall 2014/ch1a 23 ss

Security Features in Rails 4.x

Web applications can be challenging for a developer to properly secure against threats. There are many attack vectors against web applications that must be carefully considered and mitigated. The developer must be responsible to understand these threats and take the necessary steps to secure the application and data. A web application may be vulnerable due to misconfiguration, poorly written code, or through un-patched vulnerabilities.

Ruby on Rails, or just Rails, is a web application framework written in Ruby. It is a full-stack framework which attempts to make the development process easier and more accessible. This wiki aims to highlight all the security features in a Rails 4.x.

Threats Against Web Applications

Background

Web applications can be challenging for a developer to properly secure against threats. There are many attack vectors against web applications that must be carefully considered and mitigated. The developer must be responsible to understand these threats and take the necessary steps to secure the application and data. A web application may be vulnurable due to misconfiguration, poorly written code, or through un-patched vulnerabilities.The threats against web applications include

Cookie Management

Cookies are used to maintain stateful sessions in HTTP. The cookies typically contain the user's session id which is used to identify the user. By stealing it, the attacker can use the application in the victim's name. Hence programmers should not store sensitive data in cookies. The fix is

Use SSL

SSL prevents the attacker from sniffing the cookie from the network. config.force_ssl = true

New Session Identifier

Configure Rails to issue a new session identifier and declare the old one invalid after a successful login. This prevents "Session Fixation".

Timeout Cookies

Set the expiry time stamp of the cookie to a small value.

Injection

An attacker can inject client site executable code. When the victim renders it, it can steal the cookie, hijack the session and redirect the victim to a different page.

Cross Site Request Forgery (CSRF)

This attack method works by including malicious code or a link in a page that accesses a web application that the user is believed to have authenticated. If the session for that web application has not timed out, an attacker may execute unauthorized commands.

Security Token

All non GET request should use a security token.

Reference

http://blog.codeclimate.com/blog/2013/03/27/rails-insecure-defaults/

http://guides.rubyonrails.org/security.html

http://www.infoworld.com/article/2614585/patch-management/hackers-exploit-ruby-on-rails-vulnerability-to-compromise-servers--create-botnet.html