The Web Application Hacker's Handbook, 2nd Edition

Chapter 5Bypassing Client-Side Controls

Chapter 1 described how the core security problem with web applications arises because clients can submit arbitrary input. Despite this fact, a large proportion of web applications, nevertheless, rely on various measures implemented on the client side to control the data that they submit to the server. In general, this represents a fundamental security flaw: the user has full control over the client and the data it submits and can bypass any controls that are implemented on the client side and are not replicated on the server.

An application may rely on client-side controls to restrict user input in two broad ways. First, an application may transmit data via the client component using a mechanism that it assumes will prevent the user from modifying that data when the application later reads it. Second, an application may implement measures on the client side that control the user's interaction with his or her own client, with the aim of restricting functionality and/or applying controls around user input before it is submitted. This may be achieved using HTML form features, client-side scripts, or browser extension technologies.

This chapter looks at examples of each kind of client-side control and describes ways in which they can be bypassed.

Transmitting Data Via the Client

It is common to see an application passing data to the client in a form that the end user cannot directly see or modify, with the expectation that this data will ...