Web Security: A Step-by-Step Reference Guide

Written for Web site administrators, developers, and end users, this book is a readable, real-world guide to securing your Web site with the latest in security technology, techniques, and tools. Lincoln D. Stein, keeper of the official Web Security FAQ, addresses your most pressing concerns and tells you exactly what you need to know to make your site more secure. He offers concise explanations of essential theory; helps you analyze and evaluate the risks that threaten your site and the privacy of your clients; and provides concrete, step-by-step solutions, checklists of do's and don'ts, on-line and off-line resources, and hardware and software tools that guard your site against security breaches.

Web Security approaches the topic from three different points of view--protecting the end user's confidentiality and the integrity of his or her machine, protecting the Web site from intrusion and sabotage, and protecting both from third-party eavesdropping and tampering.

You will learn about

• securing credit card transactions with the SET protocol
• document encryption with the SSL protocol
• how to guard end users against the dangers of active content and cookies
• monitoring and log tools
• controlling access with passwords, client certificates, and advanced login protocols
• remote authoring
• firewalls

In addition, the book offers practical advice on configuring the operating system securely and eliminating unnecessary features that increase vulnerability. CGI scripts introduce many of the security problems that plague the Web, and this book shows how to avoid these breaches with safe CGI-scripting techniques. You will also learn how to avoid denial-of-service attacks and prevent LAN break-ins through the Web server.

After reading this book, you will have the practical knowledge you need to ensure that your Web site, and your clients' interests, are safe from attack.

Source Code

Click below for Source Code related to this title:
check_suid.txt

code.html

credit_card.txt

find_status.txt

forward.txt

log.txt

mail.txt

relaunch.txt

restart.txt

suexec_patch.txt

tempfile.txt

torture.txt

url_list.html

Customer Reviews

26 of 26 people found the following review helpful excellent for starters, April 26, 1998 By A Customer This review is from: Web Security: A Step-by-Step Reference Guide (Paperback) Explains the basics of Web Security very well. Discusses public keys, SSL, certificates and related issues in plain English; provides meaningful figures/diagrams. Nice book to own and have handy on your bookshelf. Help other customers find the most helpful reviews  Was this review helpful to you?  Report abuse | Permalink  Comment 9 of 9 people found the following review helpful Every Internet Developer needs it, January 2, 2000 By  MKhan (USA) - See all my reviews This review is from: Web Security: A Step-by-Step Reference Guide (Paperback) Before reading the book always thought that what are the ways to secure the confidential info on your web site? This book will gives you a answers to all the question. After reading the book now understands how and why? Every Project Lead plus Project Manager involved in anykind of Web development needs to have this book in their shelves. Help other customers find the most helpful reviews  Was this review helpful to you?  Report abuse | Permalink  Comment 1 of 1 people found the following review helpful Excellent, but dated, September 11, 2003 By  Eric Kent (USA) - See all my reviews This review is from: Web Security: A Step-by-Step Reference Guide (Paperback) This is an excellent book on web security. It is dated, but has a ton of good info nonetheless. Help other customers find the most helpful reviews  Was this review helpful to you?  Report abuse | Permalink  Comment

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Praise For Web Security: A Step-by-Step Reference Guide

"Unless you are Lincoln Stein, I would recommend this book to all Web developers, Web site administrators, and system administrators. The implications of ignorance are too high. The curious casual user would also enjoy gaining an understanding of Web security issues." - InfoWorld Electric, http://www.infoworld.com/

"There is an excellent discussion of the basic definition of Web Security. It brings out the often-unsaid assumptions of the user, Webmaster and the joint relations of the parties. These can be three quite different views, and the perspectives need to be explicit." - CiscoWorld, http://www.pcinews.com

“Stein starts with the basics – what are the risks to web security, and basic cryptography, and works up to access control to websites and firewalls.” - Professional Security

"Any ISP that does not have it on their customer support bookshelf should be held criminally negligent." - Robert Slades Book Reviews, http://www.freenet.victoria.bc.ca/techrev/rms.html

"If youire running a web site and you want to make it relatively safe, this is the book for you." - ;login:

"...a well-written book that will give new and overworked system administrators the on-point advice and online resources they need to improve their systems' security. It may not make the work week any shorter, but this book will help administrators avoid some of those 3:00 a.m. panic calls." - Curtis D. Frye, Dr. Dobb's Electronic Review of Computer Books

"...must reading for any Web site operator with commercial, privacy, or security considerations." -Internet Bookwatch

"This is an excellent book covering all aspects of protecting your web site and ensuring the privacy of your user's transactions through that site." - Craig Wiesner, www.wkmn.com/refer.html

"The book provides a useful list of steps companies can follow to reduce their organization's security risks." - Ellen Messmer, Network World

"While no book covers everything, and certainly not in enough detail, this one does a fine job of covering base line security for your web site. I put this one right next to his How to Set Up and Maintain a Web Site on my book shelf, with a space for his next book. Stein is making valuable contributions to solutions for web security making him worth reading." - Bob Bruen, Cipher

Read "Quotes of Note" about other titles by this author!

Preface

This is the "how not to shoot yourself in the foot" book about Web security. Enough theory to be interesting, but not so much that it gets dry and academic. Enough war stories to be fun, but not so many that they overwhelm the rest. No political agenda. No favoritism. You'll find here nothing but practical, commonsense advice for sidestepping the hoard of little gotchas that currently plague the Web, plus you'll find a framework for deciding for yourself how to handle all the gotchas that are yet to be.

Who is this book for? The first third of the book deals with problems that are relevant to anyone who uses the Web: privacy threats, the potential of the Web to spread viruses and other malicious software, the practice and pitfalls of electronic commerce. The remainder gives advice directed to Webmasters, system administrators, system security officers, and others who worry that their organizations' Web sites might be broken into or that their local area network can be compromised by nasty stuff brought in by their employees' Web surfing. If you already run a Web site, you'll want to read this book through. If you're a casual Web surfer, read the first part now and save the rest for later. If current trends continue, everyone will have a Web site and will have to worry about keeping it safe.

Web Security: A Step-by-Step Reference Guide began life about two years ago as the World Wide Web Security FAQ. I was concerned that new Web sites were going up at an amazing rate, with little appreciation for the security implications. I was dismayed that much of the advice being dispensed was incomplete or simply misinformed. So I put together 30 or so frequently asked questions (with answers) to advise Webmasters on how to keep their sites safe from attack by unwanted intruders, and I posted it on my Web site. Over a period of months, the FAQ grew considerably as readers mailed in requests for more information, suggestions, and in some cases contributed their own questions and answers. To the original sections on server-side security, I added sections dealing with client-side (browser) security, privacy issues, sections on cryptography and digital money, and an ever-growing list of security holes in specific pieces of software. In 1996, the first of an epidemic of Web site break-ins shook the Web; in its aftermath, the number of "hits" on the FAQ grew tremendously. The FAQ is now mirrored on five continents and has been translated into Russian, Italian, and Chinese.

When my editor initially suggested I turn the FAQ into a book, I was skeptical. First of all, the information was already on line. Second, the Web is changing so rapidly that any book on security issues is out of date by the time it hits the shelves. Finally, the whole FAQ was less than 50 typeset pages and I was dubious that it could be bulked up into a full-length book. To the first two objections, my editor responded that printed books and the Web are complementary. Printed books provide depth and comprehensiveness. The Web provides vast breadth and information that is always (we hope) up to date. As for my last objection, the weighty answer to that is in your hands.

Acknowledgments

I am grateful to everyone who helped during the conception, research, writing, and production of this book. Bob Bagwill, Jim Carroll, Tom Christiansen, Ian Redfern, Laura Pearlman, Bob Denny, and countless others contributed substantially to the WWW Security FAQ. Their insight and understanding has enriched the FAQ and this book, as well. Many thanks to Lewis Geer at Microsoft Corporation, who helped me sort out the ins and outs of Internet Explorer and active content, and to Brian Kendig at Netscape Corporation, who performed a similar role with Java and JavaScript. My warmest thanks also to my technical reviewers Mike Stok, Tom Markham, and Fred Douglis, each of whom came through with many helpful corrections and suggestions, in record time.

At the MIT Genome Center, many thanks to Lois Bennett and Susan Alderman, two tirelessly cheerful system administrators who never seemed to mind my turning the Web site and LAN into a laboratory bench for every new scheme I wanted to try out. I gravely promise to them that I will never again rip out all the server software and replace it with "new and improved" code at the start of a four-day weekend.

At Addison Wesley Longman, I am indebted to Carol Long, my first editor and the one who convinced me to launch this project, to Karen Gettman, who took over the project when Carol's career took her elsewhere, and to Mary Harrington, who kept everything from unraveling during the transition. Thanks also to Marilyn Rash, who coordinated the production effort.

Last, many thanks to Jean Siao, who blinked not an eye as her Macintosh was slowly swallowed by tangled mats of network cabling and spare parts. Yes, you can play SimCity now without fear of electrocution.

Table of Contents

Preface.


1. What Is Web Security?

I. DOCUMENT CONFIDENTIALITY.

II. CLIENT-SIDE SECURITY.

III. SERVER-SIDE SECURITY.