Close
  • Latest News
  • Big Data and Analytics
  • Cloud
  • Networking
  • Cybersecurity
  • Applications
  • IT Management
  • Storage
  • Sponsored
  • Mobile
  • Small Business
  • Development
  • Database
  • Servers
  • Android
  • Apple
  • Innovation
  • Blogs
  • PC Hardware
  • Reviews
  • Search Engines
  • Virtualization
Read Down
Sign in
Close
Welcome!Log into your account
Forgot your password?
Read Down
Password recovery
Recover your password
Close
Search
Logo
Logo
  • Latest News
  • Big Data and Analytics
  • Cloud
  • Networking
  • Cybersecurity
  • Applications
  • IT Management
  • Storage
  • Sponsored
  • Mobile
  • Small Business
  • Development
  • Database
  • Servers
  • Android
  • Apple
  • Innovation
  • Blogs
  • PC Hardware
  • Reviews
  • Search Engines
  • Virtualization
More
    Home Cybersecurity
    • Cybersecurity

    Google Addressing Threats From Cross-Site Scripting Errors

    By
    Jaikumar Vijayan
    -
    September 27, 2016
    Share
    Facebook
    Twitter
    Linkedin
      Google

      Google has released a new tool called CSP Evaluator that it says can help developers ensure that the polices they use for mitigating cross-site scripting errors are effective and work as intended.

      Cross-site scripting errors basically let attackers inject malicious code into a web application or webpage. Attackers often use it to insert malicious code in the HTML pages that are presented to a user visiting a website in order to infect their computers.

      Though cross-site scripting errors are well understood and have been around for years, they continue to be a major source of vulnerabilities in web applications. As a result, developers often use a mechanism known as Content Security Policy (CSP) for defining and restricting the conditions under which scripts are allowed to run in an application.

      The idea is that even if an attacker manages to inject malicious script into a webpage, they would be limited in their ability to do harm.

      “CSP is a flexible tool allowing developers to set a wide range of policies,” said Google information security engineers Artur Janc, Michele Spagnuolo, Lukas Weichselbaum and David Ross in a post on the Google Security Blog this week. Most modern browsers support CSPs, though not entirely, they noted.

      However, the flexibility has its drawbacks, the Google engineers said. Too often, developers use CSPs to set policies that only appear to work as intended but rarely do so in real life. In an analysis that Google conducted earlier this year of more than 1 billion domains, 95 percent of the deployed CSPs offered no protection against cross-site scripting attacks, they said.

      The study found that even websites and domains that many organizations trust for the purpose of loading scripts were not as safe as assumed. In fact “14 out of the 15 domains most commonly whitelisted for loading scripts contain unsafe endpoints,” the study found.

      Not surprisingly, nearly 76 percent of the policies that Google evaluated in its study had script whitelists that would have allowed attackers to bypass their CSPs.

      Google’s new CSP Evaluator aims to help address this deficiency. It helps developers visualize how their content security policies are working and to detect minor misconfigurations. Security engineers at Google currently use CSP Evaluator to ensure their CSPs provide meaningful benefit and cannot be bypassed by attackers, the four Google engineers said in their blog post.

      CSP Evaluator eliminates the need for developers to review content security policies manually and helps them harden their application against cross-site scripting attacks, Google said in an official description of the tool. The checks that are contained in the tools are based on its study of more than 1 billion domains.

      CSP Evaluator is part of a broader effort by Google to get developers to adopt a stricter approach to implementing content security policy. In addition to CSP Evaluator, the company has published new documentation on the best strategies for implementing CSP and a Chrome extension called CSP Mitigator for helping developers verify if an application is compatible with strict CSP.

      Jaikumar Vijayan
      Vijayan is an award-winning independent journalist and tech content creation specialist covering data security and privacy, business intelligence, big data and data analytics.

      MOST POPULAR ARTICLES

      Big Data and Analytics

      Alteryx’s Suresh Vittal on the Democratization of...

      James Maguire - May 31, 2022 0
      I spoke with Suresh Vittal, Chief Product Officer at Alteryx, about the industry mega-shift toward making data analytics tools accessible to a company’s complete...
      Read more
      Cybersecurity

      Visa’s Michael Jabbara on Cybersecurity and Digital...

      James Maguire - May 17, 2022 0
      I spoke with Michael Jabbara, VP and Global Head of Fraud Services at Visa, about the cybersecurity technology used to ensure the safe transfer...
      Read more
      Applications

      Cisco’s Thimaya Subaiya on Customer Experience in...

      James Maguire - May 10, 2022 0
      I spoke with Thimaya Subaiya, SVP and GM of Global Customer Experience at Cisco, about the factors that create good customer experience – and...
      Read more
      Big Data and Analytics

      GoodData CEO Roman Stanek on Business Intelligence...

      James Maguire - May 4, 2022 0
      I spoke with Roman Stanek, CEO of GoodData, about business intelligence, data as a service, and the frustration that many executives have with data...
      Read more
      Cloud

      Yotascale CEO Asim Razzaq on Controlling Multicloud...

      James Maguire - May 5, 2022 0
      Asim Razzaq, CEO of Yotascale, provides guidance on understanding—and containing—the complex cost structure of multicloud computing. Among the topics we covered:  As you survey the...
      Read more
      Logo

      eWeek has the latest technology news and analysis, buying guides, and product reviews for IT professionals and technology buyers. The site’s focus is on innovative solutions and covering in-depth technical content. eWeek stays on the cutting edge of technology news and IT trends through interviews and expert analysis. Gain insight from top innovators and thought leaders in the fields of IT, business, enterprise software, startups, and more.

      Facebook
      Linkedin
      RSS
      Twitter
      Youtube

      Advertisers

      Advertise with TechnologyAdvice on eWeek and our other IT-focused platforms.

      Advertise with Us

      Menu

      • About eWeek
      • Subscribe to our Newsletter
      • Latest News

      Our Brands

      • Privacy Policy
      • Terms
      • About
      • Contact
      • Advertise
      • Sitemap
      • California – Do Not Sell My Information

      Property of TechnologyAdvice.
      © 2022 TechnologyAdvice. All Rights Reserved

      Advertiser Disclosure: Some of the products that appear on this site are from companies from which TechnologyAdvice receives compensation. This compensation may impact how and where products appear on this site including, for example, the order in which they appear. TechnologyAdvice does not include all companies or all types of products available in the marketplace.

      ×