Christophe Zürn e8563c6351 [Education] Update code example layout of S5131 (XSS) (#1018)
* Update code examples of data encoding to use more vertical space

* Compliant / Noncompliant code examples are one after the other
2023-03-02 18:07:54 +01:00

107 lines
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include::../summary.adoc[]
== Why is this an issue?
include::../rationale.adoc[]
include::../impact.adoc[]
include::../threats.adoc[]
== How to fix it?
The following code is vulnerable to cross-site scripting because it returns an HTML response that contains unsanitized user input.
If you do not intend to send HTML code to clients, the vulnerability can be fixed by specifying the type of data returned in the response.
For example, you can use the `JsonResponse` class to safely return JSON messages.
[cols="a"]
|===
| ==== Noncompliant Code Example
|
[source,javascript]
----
function (req, res) {
json = JSON.stringify({ "data": req.query.input });
res.send(tainted); // Noncompliant
};
----
| ==== Compliant Solution
|
[source,javascript]
----
function (req, res) {
res.json({ "data": req.query.input });
};
----
|===
It is also possible to set the content-type header manually using the `content_type` parameter when creating an `HttpResponse` object.
[cols="a"]
|===
| ==== Noncompliant Code Example
|
[source,javascript]
----
function (req, res) {
res.send(req.query.input); // Noncompliant
};
----
| ==== Compliant Solution
|
[source,javascript]
----
function (req, res) {
res.set('Content-Type', 'text/plain');
res.send(req.query.input);
};
----
|===
=== How does this work?
In case the response consists of HTML code, it is highly recommended to use a template engine like https://ejs.co/[ejs] to generate it.
This template engine separates the view from the business logic and automatically encodes the output of variables, drastically reducing the risk of cross-site scripting vulnerabilities.
If you do not intend to send HTML code to clients, the vulnerability can be resolved by telling them what data they are receiving with the `content-type` HTTP header.
This header tells the browser that the response does not contain HTML code and should not be parsed and interpreted as HTML.
Thus, the HTTP response is not vulnerable to reflected Cross-Site Scripting.
For example, setting the content-type header to `text/plain` allows to safely reflect user input since browsers will not try to parse and execute the response.
=== Pitfalls
include::../common/pitfalls/content-types.adoc[]
include::../common/pitfalls/validation.adoc[]
== Resources
include::../common/resources/docs.adoc[]
* https://expressjs.com/en/api.html[Express, 4.x API]
include::../common/resources/articles.adoc[]
include::../common/resources/presentations.adoc[]
include::../common/resources/standards.adoc[]
ifdef::env-github,rspecator-view[]
'''
== Implementation Specification
(visible only on this page)
include::../message.adoc[]
include::../highlighting.adoc[]
'''
== Comments And Links
(visible only on this page)
include::../comments-and-links.adoc[]
endif::env-github,rspecator-view[]