Security Assessment Report
Vulnerability findings for the public-facing infrastructure of lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za
01 Executive overview Severity distribution across 29 findings
02 Top findings Ranked by severity
Highest-impact issues identified during the assessment (non-informational), ordered by severity.
| # | Severity | Finding | Affected | Instances |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | Medium | Absence of Anti-CSRF Tokens | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 02 | Medium | Behat Configuration File - Detect | https://lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za/behat.yml.dist | 1 |
| 03 | Medium | Content Security Policy (CSP) Header Not Set | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 04 | Medium | Sub Resource Integrity Attribute Missing | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 05 | Low | Big Redirect Detected (Potential Sensitive Information Leak) | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 4 |
| 06 | Low | Cookie with SameSite Attribute None | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 1 |
| 07 | Low | Cookie without SameSite Attribute | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 1 |
| 08 | Low | Cross-Domain JavaScript Source File Inclusion | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 09 | Low | Cross-Origin-Embedder-Policy Header Missing or Invalid | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 3 |
| 10 | Low | Cross-Origin-Opener-Policy Header Missing or Invalid | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 3 |
| 11 | Low | Cross-Origin-Resource-Policy Header Missing or Invalid | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 12 | Low | Dangerous JS Functions | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 2 |
| 13 | Low | In Page Banner Information Leak | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 2 |
| 14 | Low | Permissions Policy Header Not Set | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 15 | Low | Server Leaks Version Information via "Server" HTTP Response Header Field | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 16 | Low | Strict-Transport-Security Header Not Set | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 17 | Low | Timestamp Disclosure - Unix | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 1 |
| 18 | Low | X-Content-Type-Options Header Missing | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 19 | Informational | Authentication Request Identified | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 4 |
| 20 | Informational | Information Disclosure - Suspicious Comments | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 11 |
| 21 | Informational | Modern Web Application | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 22 | Informational | Non-Storable Content | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 5 |
| 23 | Informational | Re-examine Cache-control Directives | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 2 |
| 24 | Informational | Session Management Response Identified | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 2 |
| 25 | Informational | Storable and Cacheable Content | lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za | 4 |
03 Findings Detailed observations, ordered by severity
Each finding records what was observed, where it was observed, and supporting evidence from the scanning toolchain.
Absence of Anti-CSRF Tokens
No Anti-CSRF tokens were found in a HTML submission form.
A cross-site request forgery is an attack that involves forcing a victim to send an HTTP request to a target destination without their knowledge or intent in order to perform an action as the victim. The underlying cause is application functionality using predictable URL/form actions in a repeatable way. The nature of the attack is that CSRF exploits the trust that a web site has for a user. By contrast, cross-site scripting (XSS) exploits the trust that a user has for a web site. Like XSS, CSRF attacks are not necessarily cross-site, but they can be. Cross-site request forgery is also known as CSRF, XSRF, one-click attack, session riding, confused deputy, and sea surf.
CSRF attacks are effective in a number of situations, including:
* The victim has an active session on the target site.
* The victim is authenticated via HTTP auth on the target site.
* The victim is on the same local network as the target site.
CSRF has primarily been used to perform an action against a target site using the victim's privileges, but recent techniques have been discovered to disclose information by gaining access to the response. The risk of information disclosure is dramatically increased when the target site is vulnerable to XSS, because XSS can be used as a platform for CSRF, allowing the attack to operate within the bounds of the same-origin policy.
Phase: Architecture and Design
Use a vetted library or framework that does not allow this weakness to occur or provides constructs that make this weakness easier to avoid.
For example, use anti-CSRF packages such as the OWASP CSRFGuard.
Phase: Implementation
Ensure that your application is free of cross-site scripting issues, because most CSRF defenses can be bypassed using attacker-controlled script.
Phase: Architecture and Design
Generate a unique nonce for each form, place the nonce into the form, and verify the nonce upon receipt of the form. Be sure that the nonce is not predictable (CWE-330).
Note that this can be bypassed using XSS.
Identify especially dangerous operations. When the user performs a dangerous operation, send a separate confirmation request to ensure that the user intended to perform that operation.
Note that this can be bypassed using XSS.
Use the ESAPI Session Management control.
This control includes a component for CSRF.
Do not use the GET method for any request that triggers a state change.
Phase: Implementation
Check the HTTP Referer header to see if the request originated from an expected page. This could break legitimate functionality, because users or proxies may have disabled sending the Referer for privacy reasons.
- https://cheatsheetseries.owasp.org/cheatsheets/Cross-Site_Request_Forgery_Prevention_Cheat_Sheet.html
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/352.html
Behat Configuration File - Detect
Behat Configuration File - Detect
Content Security Policy (CSP) Header Not Set
Content Security Policy (CSP) is an added layer of security that helps to detect and mitigate certain types of attacks, including Cross Site Scripting (XSS) and data injection attacks. These attacks are used for everything from data theft to site defacement or distribution of malware. CSP provides a set of standard HTTP headers that allow website owners to declare approved sources of content that browsers should be allowed to load on that page — covered types are JavaScript, CSS, HTML frames, fonts, images and embeddable objects such as Java applets, ActiveX, audio and video files.
Ensure that your web server, application server, load balancer, etc. is configured to set the Content-Security-Policy header.
- https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Guides/CSP
- https://cheatsheetseries.owasp.org/cheatsheets/Content_Security_Policy_Cheat_Sheet.html
- https://www.w3.org/TR/CSP/
- https://w3c.github.io/webappsec-csp/
- https://web.dev/articles/csp
- https://caniuse.com/#feat=contentsecuritypolicy
- https://content-security-policy.com/
Sub Resource Integrity Attribute Missing
The integrity attribute is missing on a script or link tag served by an external server. The integrity tag prevents an attacker who have gained access to this server from injecting a malicious content.
Provide a valid integrity attribute to the tag.
- https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/Security/Defenses/Subresource_Integrity
Big Redirect Detected (Potential Sensitive Information Leak)
The server has responded with a redirect that seems to provide a large response. This may indicate that although the server sent a redirect it also responded with body content (which may include sensitive details, PII, etc.).
Ensure that no sensitive information is leaked via redirect responses. Redirect responses should have almost no content.
Cookie with SameSite Attribute None
A cookie has been set with its SameSite attribute set to "none", which means that the cookie can be sent as a result of a 'cross-site' request. The SameSite attribute is an effective counter measure to cross-site request forgery, cross-site script inclusion, and timing attacks.
Ensure that the SameSite attribute is set to either 'lax' or ideally 'strict' for all cookies.
- https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-ietf-httpbis-cookie-same-site
Cookie without SameSite Attribute
A cookie has been set without the SameSite attribute, which means that the cookie can be sent as a result of a 'cross-site' request. The SameSite attribute is an effective counter measure to cross-site request forgery, cross-site script inclusion, and timing attacks.
Ensure that the SameSite attribute is set to either 'lax' or ideally 'strict' for all cookies.
- https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/draft-ietf-httpbis-cookie-same-site
Cross-Domain JavaScript Source File Inclusion
The page includes one or more script files from a third-party domain.
Ensure JavaScript source files are loaded from only trusted sources, and the sources can't be controlled by end users of the application.
Cross-Origin-Embedder-Policy Header Missing or Invalid
Cross-Origin-Embedder-Policy header is a response header that prevents a document from loading any cross-origin resources that don't explicitly grant the document permission (using CORP or CORS).
Ensure that the application/web server sets the Cross-Origin-Embedder-Policy header appropriately, and that it sets the Cross-Origin-Embedder-Policy header to 'require-corp' for documents.
If possible, ensure that the end user uses a standards-compliant and modern web browser that supports the Cross-Origin-Embedder-Policy header (https://caniuse.com/mdn-http_headers_cross-origin-embedder-policy).
- https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Reference/Headers/Cross-Origin-Embedder-Policy
Cross-Origin-Opener-Policy Header Missing or Invalid
Cross-Origin-Opener-Policy header is a response header that allows a site to control if others included documents share the same browsing context. Sharing the same browsing context with untrusted documents might lead to data leak.
Ensure that the application/web server sets the Cross-Origin-Opener-Policy header appropriately, and that it sets the Cross-Origin-Opener-Policy header to 'same-origin' for documents.
'same-origin-allow-popups' is considered as less secured and should be avoided.
If possible, ensure that the end user uses a standards-compliant and modern web browser that supports the Cross-Origin-Opener-Policy header (https://caniuse.com/mdn-http_headers_cross-origin-opener-policy).
- https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Reference/Headers/Cross-Origin-Opener-Policy
Cross-Origin-Resource-Policy Header Missing or Invalid
Cross-Origin-Resource-Policy header is an opt-in header designed to counter side-channels attacks like Spectre. Resource should be specifically set as shareable amongst different origins.
Ensure that the application/web server sets the Cross-Origin-Resource-Policy header appropriately, and that it sets the Cross-Origin-Resource-Policy header to 'same-origin' for all web pages.
'same-site' is considered as less secured and should be avoided.
If resources must be shared, set the header to 'cross-origin'.
If possible, ensure that the end user uses a standards-compliant and modern web browser that supports the Cross-Origin-Resource-Policy header (https://caniuse.com/mdn-http_headers_cross-origin-resource-policy).
- https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Reference/Headers/Cross-Origin-Embedder-Policy
Dangerous JS Functions
A dangerous JS function seems to be in use that would leave the site vulnerable.
See the references for security advice on the use of these functions.
- https://v17.angular.io/guide/security
In Page Banner Information Leak
The server returned a version banner string in the response content. Such information leaks may allow attackers to further target specific issues impacting the product and version in use.
Configure the server to prevent such information leaks. For example:
Under Tomcat this is done via the "server" directive and implementation of custom error pages.
Under Apache this is done via the "ServerSignature" and "ServerTokens" directives.
- https://owasp.org/www-project-web-security-testing-guide/v41/4-Web_Application_Security_Testing/08-Testing_for_Error_Handling/
Permissions Policy Header Not Set
Permissions Policy Header is an added layer of security that helps to restrict from unauthorized access or usage of browser/client features by web resources. This policy ensures the user privacy by limiting or specifying the features of the browsers can be used by the web resources. Permissions Policy provides a set of standard HTTP headers that allow website owners to limit which features of browsers can be used by the page such as camera, microphone, location, full screen etc.
Ensure that your web server, application server, load balancer, etc. is configured to set the Permissions-Policy header.
- https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Reference/Headers/Permissions-Policy
- https://developer.chrome.com/blog/feature-policy/
- https://scotthelme.co.uk/a-new-security-header-feature-policy/
- https://w3c.github.io/webappsec-feature-policy/
- https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2018/12/feature-policy/
Server Leaks Version Information via "Server" HTTP Response Header Field
The web/application server is leaking version information via the "Server" HTTP response header. Access to such information may facilitate attackers identifying other vulnerabilities your web/application server is subject to.
Ensure that your web server, application server, load balancer, etc. is configured to suppress the "Server" header or provide generic details.
- https://httpd.apache.org/docs/current/mod/core.html#servertokens
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/msp-n-p/ff648552(v=pandp.10)
- https://www.troyhunt.com/shhh-dont-let-your-response-headers/
Strict-Transport-Security Header Not Set
HTTP Strict Transport Security (HSTS) is a web security policy mechanism whereby a web server declares that complying user agents (such as a web browser) are to interact with it using only secure HTTPS connections (i.e. HTTP layered over TLS/SSL). HSTS is an IETF standards track protocol and is specified in RFC 6797.
Ensure that your web server, application server, load balancer, etc. is configured to enforce Strict-Transport-Security.
- https://cheatsheetseries.owasp.org/cheatsheets/HTTP_Strict_Transport_Security_Cheat_Sheet.html
- https://owasp.org/www-community/Security_Headers
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_Strict_Transport_Security
- https://caniuse.com/stricttransportsecurity
- https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc6797
Timestamp Disclosure - Unix
A timestamp was disclosed by the application/web server. - Unix
Manually confirm that the timestamp data is not sensitive, and that the data cannot be aggregated to disclose exploitable patterns.
- https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/200.html
X-Content-Type-Options Header Missing
The Anti-MIME-Sniffing header X-Content-Type-Options was not set to 'nosniff'. This allows older versions of Internet Explorer and Chrome to perform MIME-sniffing on the response body, potentially causing the response body to be interpreted and displayed as a content type other than the declared content type. Current (early 2014) and legacy versions of Firefox will use the declared content type (if one is set), rather than performing MIME-sniffing.
Ensure that the application/web server sets the Content-Type header appropriately, and that it sets the X-Content-Type-Options header to 'nosniff' for all web pages.
If possible, ensure that the end user uses a standards-compliant and modern web browser that does not perform MIME-sniffing at all, or that can be directed by the web application/web server to not perform MIME-sniffing.
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/windows/internet-explorer/ie-developer/compatibility/gg622941(v=vs.85)
- https://owasp.org/www-community/Security_Headers
Authentication Request Identified
The given request has been identified as an authentication request. The 'Other Info' field contains a set of key=value lines which identify any relevant fields. If the request is in a context which has an Authentication Method set to "Auto-Detect" then this rule will change the authentication to match the request identified.
This is an informational alert rather than a vulnerability and so there is nothing to fix.
- https://www.zaproxy.org/docs/desktop/addons/authentication-helper/auth-req-id/
Information Disclosure - Suspicious Comments
The response appears to contain suspicious comments which may help an attacker.
Remove all comments that return information that may help an attacker and fix any underlying problems they refer to.
Modern Web Application
The application appears to be a modern web application. If you need to explore it automatically then the Client Spider may well be more effective than the standard one.
This is an informational alert and so no changes are required.
Non-Storable Content
The response contents are not storable by caching components such as proxy servers. If the response does not contain sensitive, personal or user-specific information, it may benefit from being stored and cached, to improve performance.
The content may be marked as storable by ensuring that the following conditions are satisfied:
The request method must be understood by the cache and defined as being cacheable ("GET", "HEAD", and "POST" are currently defined as cacheable)
The response status code must be understood by the cache (one of the 1XX, 2XX, 3XX, 4XX, or 5XX response classes are generally understood)
The "no-store" cache directive must not appear in the request or response header fields
For caching by "shared" caches such as "proxy" caches, the "private" response directive must not appear in the response
For caching by "shared" caches such as "proxy" caches, the "Authorization" header field must not appear in the request, unless the response explicitly allows it (using one of the "must-revalidate", "public", or "s-maxage" Cache-Control response directives)
In addition to the conditions above, at least one of the following conditions must also be satisfied by the response:
It must contain an "Expires" header field
It must contain a "max-age" response directive
For "shared" caches such as "proxy" caches, it must contain a "s-maxage" response directive
It must contain a "Cache Control Extension" that allows it to be cached
It must have a status code that is defined as cacheable by default (200, 203, 204, 206, 300, 301, 404, 405, 410, 414, 501).
- https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc7234
- https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc7231
- https://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616-sec13.html
Re-examine Cache-control Directives
The cache-control header has not been set properly or is missing, allowing the browser and proxies to cache content. For static assets like css, js, or image files this might be intended, however, the resources should be reviewed to ensure that no sensitive content will be cached.
For secure content, ensure the cache-control HTTP header is set with "no-cache, no-store, must-revalidate". If an asset should be cached consider setting the directives "public, max-age, immutable".
- https://cheatsheetseries.owasp.org/cheatsheets/Session_Management_Cheat_Sheet.html#web-content-caching
- https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTTP/Reference/Headers/Cache-Control
- https://grayduck.mn/2021/09/13/cache-control-recommendations/
Session Management Response Identified
The given response has been identified as containing a session management token. The 'Other Info' field contains a set of header tokens that can be used in the Header Based Session Management Method. If the request is in a context which has a Session Management Method set to "Auto-Detect" then this rule will change the session management to use the tokens identified.
This is an informational alert rather than a vulnerability and so there is nothing to fix.
- https://www.zaproxy.org/docs/desktop/addons/authentication-helper/session-mgmt-id/
Storable and Cacheable Content
The response contents are storable by caching components such as proxy servers, and may be retrieved directly from the cache, rather than from the origin server by the caching servers, in response to similar requests from other users. If the response data is sensitive, personal or user-specific, this may result in sensitive information being leaked. In some cases, this may even result in a user gaining complete control of the session of another user, depending on the configuration of the caching components in use in their environment. This is primarily an issue where "shared" caching servers such as "proxy" caches are configured on the local network. This configuration is typically found in corporate or educational environments, for instance.
Validate that the response does not contain sensitive, personal or user-specific information. If it does, consider the use of the following HTTP response headers, to limit, or prevent the content being stored and retrieved from the cache by another user:
Cache-Control: no-cache, no-store, must-revalidate, private
Pragma: no-cache
Expires: 0
This configuration directs both HTTP 1.0 and HTTP 1.1 compliant caching servers to not store the response, and to not retrieve the response (without validation) from the cache, in response to a similar request.
- https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc7234
- https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/html/rfc7231
- https://www.w3.org/Protocols/rfc2616/rfc2616-sec13.html
User Controllable HTML Element Attribute (Potential XSS)
This check looks at user-supplied input in query string parameters and POST data to identify where certain HTML attribute values might be controlled. This provides hot-spot detection for XSS (cross-site scripting) that will require further review by a security analyst to determine exploitability.
Validate all input and sanitize output it before writing to any HTML attributes.
- https://cheatsheetseries.owasp.org/cheatsheets/Input_Validation_Cheat_Sheet.html
04 Network & transport 3 observations
| # | Endpoint | Service | Detail | Severity |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| N-01 | 102.37.142.102:443 | https | Service https on 102.37.142.102:443/tcp | Info |
| N-02 | 102.37.142.102:80 | http | Service http on 102.37.142.102:80/tcp | Info |
| N-03 | https://lms-dev.kznhealth.gov.za/ | Status 200 | Apache HTTP Server:2.4.52, MathJax:2.7.9, Moodle, PHP, RequireJS, Ubuntu, jsDelivr | Info |
05 Additional informational findings 0 items
| # | Finding | Affected | Instances |
|---|