Secure Web Applications and Web Services Architectures

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Most applications are not designed with security in mind ... Get the concepts, architectures and vision at this seminar in cooperation with Ascure NV.

2 March 2005 (14-21)
Location: Sofitel Diegem (Diegem near Brussels (Belgium))
Presented in English
Price: 480 EUR (excl. 21% VAT)

This event is history, please check out the List of Upcoming Seminars, or send us an email

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 Learning Objectives

Why this seminar?

Web Applications have become the point of entry to critical and confidential data, and have become the interface to internal resources, e-business and e-government platforms. Yet, we read time-and-time again that important data has been exposed and compromised via insecure Web applications.

Web Services may not be really visible, but there are more and more of them everyday. They are being set up both internally within organisations to facilitate internal communications and processes, and externally to facilitate the exchange of business-critical (e.g. financial) data. Most of these Web Services lack any solid security.

Everyone is using these technologies to unlock data and processes, even over the Internet. The advantages of being able to flexibly reach anyone, anywhere, anytime are clear. However, it is important to unlock wisely and in a controlled fashion.

This seminar will give a good insight in these topics. It will refrain from being highly technical and try to run you conceptually through the different topics which should be looked at when setting up any Web Application or Web Services Architecture.

First of all, we will set the scene using some simple examples of how Web resources can and are easily exploited. Then, we will give an overview of the scene, and list potential procedural and technical controls to mitigate these risks.

Secondly, we will get into Web application security specifics: how should Web applications be securely developed and what extra layer of security can be put in place to mitigate human/programmer's failure ?

Thirdly, we will add identity and access control management as an important component, and show how this best fits into Web environments. Finally, we will look at Web services, their specific security issues and how the lessons we already learned can be re-applied to these Web services.

Questions answered in this seminar

• How can Web resources be exploited (= abused) ?
• How do I assess risks ?
• What are the generic (not application-specific) building blocks to secure my environment ?
• What are the development guidelines and principles for secure Web applications, and how do I mitigate human/programmer's failure ?
• How does Identity and Access control fit in Web environments ?
• What are the security aspects of Web services and service-oriented architectures ?

Who should attend this seminar ?

• "Business-side" people (responsible for e-Business, e-Government, e-Services and/or internal business processes/data) who want to understand how their valuable data is being unlocked and exposed, what the coinciding risks might be and what security controls and assurances they can and should demand.
• "IT-side" people who want to get a clear view of those risks and the measures they should take to warrant the security of their IT-services/architectures.
• Security people (of course) who have to guide and guard the process and to help both worlds to take the right decisions together.

 Full Programme

Web applications are omni-present, but few people seem to understand to what a degree those applications can expose their environment. In this introductory session we will try to give you an insight why almost 80% of the hacks today involve Web application hacking. We will take you conceptually through a number of scenarios which might expose your data and/or your organisation.

• Specific web-attacks: hidden field manipulation, cookie poisoning, backdoor & debug options, application buffer overflow, stealth commanding, 3rd party misconfigurations, known vulnerabilities, parameter tampering, cross site scripting, forceful browsing, SQL injection, ...

Once your risks and required controls are known, things need to be put in place. And as security is determined by the weakest link, this session will look at all architectural and procedural elements you should have in place if you want to have a trust-worthy environment. We will give you a good insight into what concepts like multi-layer defence and time-based security really means and why you need to have those in mind.

• Risk management aspects: applying frameworks, baselines and risk management techniques to Web application and Web services environments
• Layered Security Aspects: Network-layer controls, System-Layer Controls, Application-Layer Controls, etc. Understanding the (in)abilities of firewalls, application-level firewalls, intrusion detection, anti-virus, ...
• Policies-elements and Crucial Processes: Personnel Security, Physical & Environmental Security, Communications and Operations Management, Access Control, Systems Development and Maintenance, Compliance, ISO17799, ...

As becomes clear over and over again: the development department needs to work under severe time constraints, constantly changing requirements, ever-evolving technical evolutions, ... and worst of all without any clear principles or guidelines on how to deliver secure applications. In this session, we therefore want to give you some insight on what your development department should know and how things could be put under control methodologically.

• Some rules and techniques (at conceptual level):
  • Validate input and output
  • Fail securely
  • Make it simple
  • Use and reuse trusted components
  • Defense in depth
  • Only as secure as the weakest link
  • No security by obscurity
  • Least privilege
  • Compartimentalization
  • Trust no one
  • Input validation
  • Stored procedures
  • Session management

Even with the best of guidelines, even with the best procedures, things sometimes go wrong, or required changes can not be executed due to conflicts with the production environment. What do you do if the alarm goes off but your hands are tied ? This session explains how Web application firewalls can buy you critical time and what their impact is on your environment.

• An overview of mitigating solutions in the market place.
• Understand how Web application firewalls work and buy you time
• Where to put Web application firewalls and the possible consequences
• Creating rules and tuning Web application firewalls
• What (and what not) to log

Even the best of controls can not function properly if you haven't got a clue who is doing what, where and when. Identities, roles and privileges must be uniquely determined and stringently administered. This session will take you through the most important aspects of identity management, role- and privilege-based access. Also, you will get some insights into different federation models and what can or can not work. Finally as identities in the Web services world are no different from identities in the Web application world, we will give you some ideas on how to keep both worlds in sync.

• The building blocks of IAM in a web-context
• Identity Management and Provisioning issues
• Successful Access Management strategies
• Authentication-, Assertion- and PKI-integration specifics
• Delegated administration versus Federation

Web services are not only rapidly becoming a cornerstone in backend connectivity and enterprise application integration (EAI), but they are also about to cause the same evolution boom as Web applications did. Regrettably, few of the Web services already in production have true security on board. Partly, because it is just standardizing. This presentation will give you a look ahead on how to successfully protect your Web services.

• Web services: already in more places then you would think.
• Web services security models and features (WSTrust, WSS, SAML, ...)
• Which features to use when and where ?
• Integration of IAM and Web services

 Speakers

ir. Erik R. van Zuuren MBA is Business Unit Manager InfoSec Architectures and Principal InfoSec / RM Consultant and has an extensive experience in Information Security Governance and Risk Management related disciplines, both at strategic and tactical level and has an extensive experience at C-level in the private sector and management- / cabinet-level in the public sector.

ir. Erik R. van Zuuren MBA is active as consultant since over 10 years and since participated in and led a broad range of strategic and tactical projects mostly in Belgium and The Netherlands. Some examples of his experience are:

• extensive experience in governments (Belgian Federal and Flemish) and related agencies and wide experience in a diverse spectrum of private industry (financial/insurance/industry/energy/...).
• one of the fathers/authors of the blueprint for the Belgian Personal Identity Card Project (BelPIC) and e.g. program manager for the Flemish government’s identity and access management platform.
• assistant to several CIO/CTO/CISO’s and coach in several Information- and ICT- Security projects (incl. strategic level, tactical level, architectural angle, organisational/procedural angle, ...)
• creator of security strategies, policies, frameworks and architectures for medium/large organisations, multinationals and government agencies
• creator of e-business- and e-government enabling Identity and Access Control Management as well as Public Key Infrastructure blueprints, concepts and architectures
• co-organiser/chairman/speaker/moderator at several security- and ICT-related events (CSI US, LSEC, esec2001-esec2004, ITworks, ...)

Questions about this ? Interested but you can't attend ? Send us an email !