Site Security Policy

Sunday, June 8th, 2008

OK gang, this is one of those rare moments where feedback from community will directly influence a security feature that’ll make a real difference. First some background... About 6 months ago Brandon Sterne left a cushy infosec position at eBay for Mozilla to solve an extremely important Web security problem he ...

Making The Move To Multiple Browsers

Tuesday, June 3rd, 2008

For a while now I’ve been using different web browsers to compartmentalize my risk. Most of my primary browsing is in one browser, but I use another for potentially risky activities I want to isolate more. Running different browsers for different sessions isolates certain types of attacks. For example, unless ...

Firefox developers tinker with new security protections

Tuesday, May 20th, 2008

Developers of the Firefox browser are designing new technologies aimed at protecting users from some of the nastiest and most prevalent forms of website attacks. One protection is designed to minimize end users' risk to cross-site scripting (XSS) attacks and cross-site request forgeries (CSRFs), both of which subvert basic internet security ...

Tomorrow’s Malware

Tuesday, May 20th, 2008

My favorite tech quote is from Giorgio Maone. It goes like this: If today’s malware mostly runs on Windows because it’s the commonest executable platform, tomorrow’s will likely run on the Web, for the very same reason. Because, like it or not, Web is already a huge executable platform, and ...

The Snare Of Unauthorized Requests

Monday, April 21st, 2008

Almost everyone knows what CSRF or better unauthorized requests are. I never really embraced CSRF as the correct term for unauthorized request issues, because the term is outdated and inadequate to contemporary hacking. For me, an unauthorized request is the layer or automation of a hacking procedure without direct interference ...

Click A Link, Go To Jail

Thursday, March 20th, 2008

Whelp, we’ve talked about it, but now it’s finally possible. CSRF can now cause jail time. The FBI has begun arresting people who click on links to supposed child pornography. Now, I understand the noble pursuit, but there’s a fairly huge flaw in the old logic. I can force users ...