Cross-Site Scripting

Cross-site scripting ('XSS' or 'CSS') is an attack that takes advantage of a Web site vulnerability in which the site displays content that includes un-sanitized user-provided data. For example, an attacker might place a hyperlink with an embedded malicious script into an online discussion forum. That purpose of the malicious script is to attack other forum users who happen to select the hyperlink. For example it could copy user cookies and then send those cookies to the attacker.

Details

Web sites today are more complex than ever and often contain dynamic content to enhance the user experience. Dynamic content is achieved through the use of Web applications that can deliver content to a user according to their settings and needs.

While performing different user customizations and tasks, many sites take input parameters from a user and display them back to the user, usually as a response to the same page request. Examples of such behavior include the following.

• Search engines which present the search term in the title ("Search Results for: search_term")
• Error messages which contain the erroneous parameter
• Personalized responses ("Hello, username")

Cross-site scripting attacks occur when an attacker takes advantage of such applications and creates a request with malicious data (such as a script) that is later presented to the user requesting it. The malicious content is usually embedded into a hyperlink, positioned so that the user will come across it in a web site, a Web message board, an email, or an instant message. If the user then follows the link, the malicious data is sent to the Web application, which in turn creates an output page for the user, containing the malicious content. The user, however, is normally unaware of the attack, and assumes the data originates from the Web server itself, leading the user to believe this is valid content from the Web site.

For example, consider a Web application that requires users to log in to visit an authorized area. When users wish to view the authorized area, they provide their username and password, which is then checked against a user database table. Now, assume that this login system contains two pages: Login.asp, which created a form for the users to enter their username and password; and the page CheckCredentials.asp, which checks if the supplied username/password are valid. If the username/password are invalid, CheckCredentials.asp uses (for example), a Response.Redirect to send the user back to Login.asp, including an error message string in the query string . The Response.Redirect call will be something like the following.

Response.Redirect("Login.asp?ErrorMessage=Invalid+username+or+password")

Then, in Login.asp, the error message query string value would be displayed as follows:

Using this technique, when users attempt to login with an invalid username or password, they are returned to Login.asp and a short message is displayed indicating that their username/password were invalid. By changing the ErrorMessage value, an attacker can embed malicious JavaScript code into the generated page, causing execution of the script on the computer of the user viewing the site. For example, assume that Login.asp is being called using the following URL.

http://www.somesite.com/Login.asp?ErrorMessage=

As in the code for Login.asp, the ErrorMessage query string value will be emitted, producing the following HTML page:

The attacker embedded HTML code into this page in such a way that when users browse this page, their supplied username and password are submitted to the following page.

http://www.hax0r.com/stealPassword.asp

An attacker can send a link to the contrived page via an email message or a link from some message board site, hoping that a user will click on the link and attempt to login. Of course, by attempting to login, the user will be submitting his username and password to the attacker's site.

Prevention

Cross-site scripting is one of the easiest attacks to detect, yet many Intrusion Prevention Systems fail to do so. The reason why cross-site scripting can be easily detected is that unlike most application level attacks, cross-site scripting can be detected using a signature. The simple text pattern

To accurately detect cross-site scripting attacks the product must know where and when to look for that signature. Most cross-site scripting attacks occur either with error pages or with parameter values. Therefore the product needs to look for cross-site scripting signatures either within parameter values or within requests that return error messages. To look for signatures in parameters values the product must parse the URL correctly and retrieve the value part and then search for the signature on the value while overcoming encoding issues. To look for signatures in pages that return error messages the product needs to know that the specific URL returned an error code. Intrusion Detection and Prevention Systems which are not Web application oriented simply do not implement these very advanced capabilities.