Re: Comparison report on web app security scanners

[Jeremiah Grossman <jeremiah () whitehatsec com>]

I started giving presentations on this subject at Blackhat in 2004.

"Challenges of Automated Web Application Scanning"
http://www.whitehatsec.com/presentations/challenges_of_scanning.pdf

To summarize....

My company, WhiteHat Security, has been developing web application  
scanning technology for years. We use the technology to make our  
continuous vulnerability assessment service efficient.  After  
assessing thousands of websites, here are two things we've learned  
about scanning websites:

- Its possible to design a website that CAN'T be scanned
- Its possible to design a website where a scanner WILL find everything

Websites such as these are edge cases. The rest of the worlds  
millions of websites fall somewhere in the middle where they are  
partially scannable. In my experience, scanners can only reliably  
TEST for about half of the possible vulnerabilities in a website.  
These observations have brought us to the following conclusions:

- Scanners find vulnerabilities and save time.
- Experiences security engineers must find the "logical flaws"

Only by combining the two is it possible to achieve comprehensiveness  
and due diligence.


As for a industry wide comparison of web application scanners,  
running them against a handful of staged websites is not going to  
yield compelling results. The only way I can see it done is stacking  
them side-by-side to see what they do support. Then anyone can run a  
demo on their own website to see if the solution works for their  
particular situation.



Regards,

Jeremiah Grossman
Founder and CTO
WhiteHat Security, Inc.
www.whitehatsec.com


On May 16, 2006, at 7:52 AM, Ory Segal wrote:

> Hello,
>
> I would like to add several important comments to this thread, in  
> behalf
> of Watchfire:
>
> According to tests done in Watchfire's labs, when using AppScan 6.0  
> SP2
> + update 553 on the WebGoat application - AppScan will find 85 links,
> will create 9557 tests and will eventually find 31 issues (211  
> different
> test variants).
>
> People who perform such benchmarks against WebGoat should pay  
> attention
> to the fact that AppScan needs some configuration in order to run
> successfully on this application -
>
> - Explore method should be set to DFS (Depth First)
> - Scan should be done in Single threaded mode
> - Path limit should be disabled (no path limit)
> - Depth limit should be enabled (otherwise one of the lessons gets  
> into
> an infinite loop)
> - HTTP Authentication - use guest/guest
> - Add the "Screen" parameter to the black-list (untested parameters)
> - Auto-form filler should be enabled
>
> (!!!) IMPORTANT: all of the above configuration items existed in  
> AppScan
> for a long time, these were not added in order to "cook the  
> product" to
> work properly on WebGoat.
>
> In addition I support what Acunetix mentioned, WebGoat and the
> FoundStone (Hackme) banking applications are poor examples to be  
> testing
> on.
>
> I am also quoting Mark Curphey (OWASP), regarding OWASP's WebGoat
> project:
> "That said its (i.e. Foundstone's HackMe bank) not a good benchmarking
> tool for testing these tools, nor is WebGoat"  - taken from:
> http://seclists.org/lists/webappsec/2005/Oct-Dec/0025.html
>
> Thank you very much,
> -Ory Segal
> Watchfire
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Bogdan Calin [mailto:bogdan () acunetix com]
> Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 17:10
> To: webappsec () securityfocus com
> Cc: Holger.Peine () iese fraunhofer de
> Subject: Re: Comparison report on web app security scanners
>
> Hello,
>
> A few days ago Dr. Holger Peine published a "Comparison report on web
> app security scanners".
>
> For this report he used two web applications: one of them is  
> WebGoat and
> the other one is a proprietary application which is not public.
>
> I don't know anything about this proprietary application but I would
> like to say that WebGoat is not a good test case for evaluating web
> scanners.
>
> WebGoat is using server side state variables to track user actions.  
> For
> example, if you want to test the String SQL injection flaw you first
> need to navigate to the "String SQL injection" section in order to set
> the proper state of the application.
>
> If the application is not in the proper state, the SQL injection test
> will not work. The application will just ignore your inputs.
>
> An automated scanner cannot guess this application behavior, and  
> unless
> you optimize your scanner for this particular application it will  
> not be
> able to scan it properly.
>
> When the scanner has finished discovering the site structure, WebGoat
> will be in some unknown state. All tests will be performed while  
> WebGoat
> is in this state.
>
> This is not a common implementation.
>
> Because we are offering free audits, we have audited more than 1,000
> websites and didn't encountered this kind of implementation.
>
> WebGoat is great for learning about web security flaws but I don't  
> think
> it should be used as a test case for web security scanners.
>
> Bogdan Calin
> Acunetix Ltd. - www.acunetix.com
> Acunetix Web Vulnerability Scanner
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> --
> -
> Sponsored by: Watchfire
>
> Watchfire named worldwide market share leader in web application
> security assessment by leading market research firm. Watchfire's  
> AppScan
> is the industry's first and leading web application security testing
> suite, and the only solution to provide comprehensive remediation  
> tasks
> at every level of the application. See for yourself.
> Download a Free Trial of AppScan 6.0 today!
>
> https://www.watchfire.com/securearea/appscansix.aspx? 
> id=701300000007t9c
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> --
> --
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> ---
> Sponsored by: Watchfire
>
> Watchfire named worldwide market share leader in web application  
> security
> assessment by leading market research firm. Watchfire's AppScan is the
> industry's first and leading web application security testing  
> suite, and
> the only solution to provide comprehensive remediation tasks at every
> level of the application. See for yourself.
> Download a Free Trial of AppScan 6.0 today!
>
> https://www.watchfire.com/securearea/appscansix.aspx? 
> id=701300000007t9c
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 
> ----


-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sponsored by: Watchfire

Watchfire named worldwide market share leader in web application security 
assessment by leading market research firm. Watchfire's AppScan is the 
industry's first and leading web application security testing suite, and 
the only solution to provide comprehensive remediation tasks at every 
level of the application. See for yourself. 
Download a Free Trial of AppScan 6.0 today!

https://www.watchfire.com/securearea/appscansix.aspx?id=701300000007t9c
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