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SQL Injection : Platform-Level Defenses - Using Runtime Protection (part 2) - Intercepting Filters

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Intercepting Filters

Most WAFs implement the Intercepting Filter pattern or include one or more implementations in their overall architecture. Filters are a series of independent modules that you can chain together to perform processing before and after the core processing of a requested resource (Web page, URL, script, etc.). Filters do not have explicit dependencies on each other; this allows you to add new filters without affecting existing filters. This modularity makes filters reusable across applications. You can add filters to applications at deployment when implemented as a Web server plug-in or when activated dynamically within an application configuration file.

Filters are ideal for performing centralized, repeatable tasks across requests and responses that are loosely coupled with core application logic. They are also good for security functions such as input validation, request/response logging, and transforming outgoing responses. In the next two sections, we’re going to look at two common filter implementations: Web server plug-ins and application framework modules. You can use both of them for runtime SQL injection protection. Figure 1 shows where each is executed as the HTTP request and response passes to/from the Web browser.

Figure 1. Diagram Depicting Web Server and Application Filters


Web Server Filters

You can implement filters as Web server modules/plug-ins, which extend the core request and response handling application program interface (API) of the Web server platform. Basically, requests and responses handled by the Web server pass through a series of phases, and modules can register for execution at each phase. Web server modules permit customized handling of a request before the request reaches the Web application and after it has generated a response. All of this occurs independently of other Web server modules that might be registered and independently of the Web application’s underlying logic. This feature makes Web server modules a good implementation choice for filters. Popular Web server platforms such as Apache, Netscape, and Internet Information Server (IIS) all support this type of architecture. Unfortunately, because each exposes its own API, you cannot leverage the modules across Web server platforms.

A clear advantage of Web server modules is that they are not bound to a particular Web application framework or programming language. For example, IIS plug-ins, called ISAPI filters, can be used to validate and monitor requests bound for classic ASP and ASP.NET Web applications, as well as transform their response content. When the Web server is configured to use a connector (a filter that routes requests to the appropriate resource handler) or in reverse proxy server mode, filters can be leveraged to protect virtually any Web application (i.e., you can use IIS ISAPI filters to protect J2EE, PHP, and ColdFusion Web applications). Lastly, because filters are executed for every Web page request, performance is critical. Web server filters are typically implemented in a native programming language such as C or C++, which can be very fast, but has the potential to introduce new classes of vulnerabilities to consider, such as buffer overflows and format string issues.

Web server modules are an important component of runtime security because of the request and response handling APIs they expose. This allows you to extend the behavior of the Web server to meet your specific needs, such as writing a filter for SQL injection protection. Luckily, you can use several freely available Web server filter implementations for SQL injection protection. We already discussed ModSecurity, an Apache API module which offers considerable SQL injection protection. What follows is a brief description of UrlScan and WebKnight, ISAPI filters that plug into the IIS Web server platform and provide SQL injection protection:

  • UrlScan In June 2008, Microsoft released Version 3.1 of UrlScan as an upgrade to the 2.5 version originally released as part of the IIS Lock Down Tool. Like its predecessor, 3.1 is a free ISAPI filter that blocks certain malicious requests; however, this version is geared toward application-level attacks—specifically, SQL injection, as it was released in response to the mass SQL injection worms that began infecting Web sites in early 2008. This new version supports creating custom rules for blocking certain malicious requests; however, its protection is limited to querystrings, headers, and cookies. You can apply the rules to any Web resource hosted on the server, such as classic ASP and ASP.NET resources. It also enhances the normal IIS logging facilitates, supports a logging-only mode, and is configurable from the urlscan.ini file.

    Unfortunately, regular expressions are not supported and POST data is not protected. These two limitations make UrlScan a less-than-optimal solution for SQL injection protection. Because it is easy to install, it could be useful for legacy applications where code modifications are not an option and a quick band-aid solution is needed.

  • WebKnight Like UrlScan, WebKnight is implemented as an IIS ISAPI filter that blocks certain malicious requests. It matches all of the features offered by UrlScan, and by far its biggest benefit over UrlScan is that it can check POST data for malicious input. It is highly configurable and comes with a GUI, which makes it easier to configure than UrlScan. In fact, you can import your UrlScan settings into WebKnight. Unfortunately, like UrlScan, WebKnight does not support regular expressions and so is limited to blacklist keyword validation. Additionally, POST data protection requires that you set up WebKnight as a global filter, which for IIS 6.0 Web servers means running in IIS 5.0 Isolation Mode.

    WebKnight is a better solution than UrlScan when it comes to SQL injection due to its more comprehensive coverage of the request. It is also easy to install, but its lack of support for regular expressions and a positive security model make it more of a quick band-aid solution or an initial defense mechanism against automated SQL injection worms.

    You can download WebKnight at www.aqtronix.com.

Tools & Traps…

Know Your Filter

Before using a filter to protect your Web application from SQL injection, it’s important that you understand how the filter works and the type of protection it provides. Although filters are valuable runtime security tools, they can introduce a false sense of security if you do not completely understand their behavior and security model. Microsoft’s UrlScan 3.1 is a good example of this, as it provides only querystring, header, and cookie protection. Pages with POST parameters vulnerable to SQL injection will be left exposed to exploitation.


Application Filters

You also can implement filters in the Web application’s programming language or framework. The architecture is similar to that of Web server plug-ins: Modular code executes as requests and responses pass through a series of phases. You can use the ASP.NET System. Web.IHttpModule interface and the javax.servlet.Filter interface to implement the filter pattern. You can then add them to an application without code changes and activate them declaratively in the application configuration file. Figure 8 shows an example code snippet of the doFilter method of a custom J2EE Filter class. This method is called for each request/ response pair due to a request for a J2EE Web resource ( JSP file, servlet, etc.).

Figure 8. Code Snippet of a Custom J2EE Filter Class
public class SqlInjDetectionFilter implements Filter {
   public void doFilter(ServletRequest req, ServletResponse res,
       chain filterChain) throws IOException, ServletException
   {
   // Check request data for malicious characters
  doDetectSqlI(req, res);
  // Call next filter in the chain
  chain.doFilter(servletRequest, servletResponse);
  }
}


In terms of runtime protection, application filters are really nice because they can be developed independent of the application, deployed as a stand-alone .dll or .jar file, and turned on immediately. This means this solution can be deployed more quickly in certain organizations because Web server configuration changes are not required (in many organizations, application developers do not have access to the Web servers and so must coordinate with the Web server team to make the configuration changes associated with a Web server filter). Because these filters are implemented in the same programming language as the application, they can extend or closely wrap existing application behavior. For this same reason, their utility is limited to applications built on the same framework (refer to the Tools and Traps sidebar, “Protecting Web Applications with ASP.NET and IIS,” for information on how you can overcome this limitation).

Similar to Web server filters, application filters allow you to add security features, such as malicious request detection, prevention, and logging, to vulnerable Web applications. Because they can be written in feature-rich object-oriented languages such as Java and C#, they are usually less complex to code and do not introduce new vulnerability classes such as buffer overflows. OWASP Stinger and Secure Parameter Filter (SPF) are free application filters that you can use to detect and block SQL injection attacks. 

Tools & Traps…

Protecting Web Applications with ASP.NET and IIS

Web applications that are not built on the .NET Framework, but run on IIS (PHP, classic ASP, Perl, etc.), can be processed by ASP.NET code modules by mapping their file type (.php, .asp, .pl, etc.) to an ASP.NET ISAPI dynamic link library (DLL). You can configure this under the application’s configuration in IIS with the Application Configuration | Mappings tab. In this scenario, an ASP.NET HttpModule that performs input validation and logging can now be leveraged on non-ASP.NET Web applications. However, there are limitations on what you can do to the request and response, especially in the area of response transformation.

The IIS 7.0 ASP.NET Integrated Mode enhances this capability further by combining the ASP.NET request pipeline with the IIS core request pipeline. Essentially, you can plug ASP.NET HttpModules into IIS and have control over the entire request and response that in previous versions of IIS was possible only with an ISAPI filter. This gives HttpModules the capability to perform comprehensive processing of requests and responses, and permits a module such as SPF to provide non-editable input protection to non-ASP.NET Web applications through transformation of response content. For more information on the type of protection SPF provides, refer to “Non-Editable versus Editable Input Protection.”


Implementing the Filter Pattern in Scripted Languages

For Web scripting languages, the filter pattern can be more difficult to implement. Technologies such as PHP and classic ASP don’t provide built-in interfaces for hooking into request/ response handling before/after page execution. You could use a Web server filter or even an application filter (refer to the Tools and Traps sidebar, “Protecting Web Applications with ASP. NET and IIS,” for more details) to protect a vulnerable classic ASP application; however, this requires administrative privileges on the Web server to make configuration changes, which may not always be the case or may not be convenient. Additionally, you may not want to modify the code for reasons discussed at the start of “Using Runtime Protection.”

For PHP Web applications, you can leverage the auto_ prepend_ file and auto_append_ file configuration directives in the php.ini file. These directives point to PHP files that will be executed before and after the execution of every PHP script that is requested. The added-in logic would loop through the various HTTP request collections (querystring, POST, cookies, headers, etc.) and validate and/or log as necessary.

An alternative for both PHP and classic ASP applications is to use include files.

This requires code modification in the form of adding include directives on every application page. Similarly, the included logic would loop through the various HTTP request collections and validate and/or log as necessary.

Filtering Web Service Messages

The intercepting filter pattern is also easy to apply to XML Web Services with custom input and output filters. An input filter could perform validation of method parameters and log SQL injection attempts. You also could use an output filter to suppress error details, such as those that often leak out in the faultstring of the Soap Fault message. The .NET Web Services and Apache Axis platforms provide mechanisms for filtering inbound and outbound messages.

ModSecurity can also handle inbound XML messages to perform validation and logging with the XML TARGET. Validation can be performed with XPATH queries or against a schema or document type definition (DTD) file. Commercial XML firewalls can also be considered, although they are typically network appliances and likely overkill if you are just looking for SQL injection protection.

Non-Editable versus Editable Input Protection

Almost every filter implementation employs blacklist protection, whereas whitelist validation, which is much more powerful and effective against SQL injection, is less prevalent and often complex to configure. This is likely because defining an exact match (i.e., whitelist) for every request parameter is a daunting task, even if a learning mode is available. This is especially true for inputs that except free-form text, such as textboxes.

Another input validation strategy to consider is classifying application inputs as editable and non-editable, and locking down the non-editable inputs so that they cannot be manipulated. Non-editable inputs are those that end users do not need to modify directly—hidden form fields, URIs and querystring parameters, cookies, etc. The theory behind the strategy is that the application should permit users to perform only those actions that the user interface has presented to them. The idea is to leverage HTTP responses at runtime to identify all legitimate requests (forms and links), collect the state of each possible request, and then validate subsequent requests against the stored state information. For many applications, non-editable inputs are the majority of input accepted by an application. Therefore, if you can lock these down automatically at runtime, you can then focus your efforts on comprehensively validating the editable inputs, which is usually a much more manageable task.

Examples of technologies that implement this strategy are HTTP Data Integrity Validator (HDIV) and SPF. You can use HDIV to protect most J2EE Web applications that follow the Model-View-Controller (MVC) pattern and you can download it at www.hdiv.org. You can use SPF to protect ASP.NET Web applications when run on IIS 6.0; however, it can be leveraged to protect virtually any Web application when run on IIS 7.0. Refer to the Tools and Traps sidebar, “Protecting Web Applications with ASP.NET and IIS,” for more information. You can download SPF at www.gdssecurity.com/l/spf/.

URL/Page-Level Strategies

Let’s look at some other techniques for virtual-patching a vulnerable URL or page without changing the source code.

Page Overriding

If a page is vulnerable and needs replacing, you can create a replacement page or class that is substituted at runtime. The substitution is accomplished with configuration in the Web application’s configuration file. In ASP.NET applications, you can use HTTP handlers to accomplish this task.

Figure 9 shows a custom HTTP handler configured to handle requests to PageVulnToSqlI.aspx instead of the vulnerable page itself. The substituted handler class implements the logic of the original page in a secure manner. This could include stringent validation of request parameters and the use of secure data access objects.

Figure 9. Configuring an HTTP Handler in web.config
<httpHandlers>
   <add verb="*"
     path="PageVulnToSqlI.aspx"
     type="Chapter9.Examples.SecureAspxHandler, Subclass"
     validate="false" />
</httpHandlers>


You can use a similar approach in the deployment descriptor of a J2EE Web application. You can map the vulnerable URL to a servlet that handles the request in a secure manner, as shown in Figure 10.

Figure 10. Configuring a Substitute Servlet in web.xml
<servlet>
   <servlet-name>SecureServlet</servlet-name>
   <servlet-class>chapter9.examples.SecureServletClass</servlet-class>
</servlet>
..
<servlet-mapping>
   <!--<servlet-name>ServletVulnToSqli</servlet-name>-->
   <servlet-name>SecureServlet</servlet-name>
   <url-pattern>/ServletVulnToSqli</url-pattern>
</servlet-mapping>


URL Rewriting

A somewhat similar technique to page overriding is URL rewriting. You can configure the Web server or application framework to take requests that are made to a vulnerable page or URL and redirect them to an alternative version of the page. This new version of the page would implement the logic of the original page in a secure manner. The redirection should be performed server-side so that it remains seamless to the client. There are a number of ways to accomplish this depending on the Web server and application platform. The Apache module mod_rewrite and the .NET Framework urlMappings element are two examples.

Resource Proxying/Wrapping

You can combine resource proxying/wrapping with either page overriding or URL rewriting to minimize the amount of custom coding needed in the replacement page. When the replacement page handles the rewritten request, it would iterate through the request parameters (querystring, POST, cookies, etc.) and perform the required validations. If the request is deemed safe, the request would be permitted to pass on to the vulnerable page via an internal server request. The vulnerable page would then handle the input and perform whatever rendering is needed. Passing input to the vulnerable page in this manner is okay because the replacement page already performed the necessary validation. Essentially, the replacement page wraps the vulnerable page, but does not require duplication of logic.

Aspect-Oriented Programming (AOP)

Aspect-oriented programming is a technique for building common, reusable routines that can be applied applicationwide. During development this facilitates separation of core application logic and common, repeatable tasks (input validation, logging, error handling, etc.).

At runtime, you can use AOP to hot-patch applications that are vulnerable to SQL injection, or embed intrusion detection and audit logging capabilities directly into an application without modifying the underlying source code. The centralization of security logic is similar to the intercepting filter previously discussed, except the benefits of AOP can extend well beyond the Web tier. You can apply security aspects to data access classes, thick client applications, and middle-tier components, such as Enterprise JavaBeans (EJBs). For example, you could implement checks for insecure dynamic SQL libraries (e.g., executeQuery( )), prevent the query from executing, and log the offending call for follow-up remediation efforts. There are a number of AOP implementations, but some of the more common ones are AspectJ, Spring AOP, and Aspect.NET.

Application Intrusion Detection Systems (IDSs)

You could use traditional network-based IDSs to detect SQL injection attacks; however, these IDSs are often not optimal, as they are far removed from the application and Web server. However, if you already have one of these running on your network you could still leverage it for an initial line of defense.

As mentioned previously, a WAF can serve as a very good IDS because it operates at the application layer and can be finely tuned for the specific application being protected. Most WAFs come with a passive mode and with alerting capabilities. In many production application environments, using a security filter or WAF in this capacity is preferred. You can use them to detect attacks and alert administrators who can then decide what should be done about the vulnerability—for example, perhaps enabling blocking of malicious requests for the specific page/parameter combination or applying a virtual patch.

Another option is an embedded solution such as PHPIDS (http://php-ids.org/). PHPIDS does not filter or sanitize input, but rather detects attacks and takes action based on its configuration. This could range from simple logging to sending out an emergency e-mail to the development team, displaying a warning message for the attacker or even ending the user’s session.

Database Firewall

The last runtime protection technique we’ll cover is the database firewall, which is essentially a proxy server that sits between the application and the database. The application connects to the database firewall and sends the query as though it were normally connecting to the database. The database firewall analyzes the intended query and passes it on to the database server for execution if deemed safe. Alternatively, it can prevent the query from being run if malicious. It can also serve as an application-level IDS for malicious database activity by monitoring connections in passive mode and altering administrators of suspicious behavior. In terms of SQL injection, database firewalls could potentially be just as effective if not more so than WAFs. Consider that the queries the Web application sends to the database are, for the most part, a known quantity of commands, and their structure is known as well. You can leverage this information to configure a highly tuned set of rules that takes appropriate action (log, block, etc.) against unusual or malicious queries before ever hitting the database. One of the hardest problems with locking down input in a WAF is that malicious users can send in any combination of requests to the Web server. An example open source implementation is GreenSQL, which you can download at www.greensql.net.

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