Absolute AppSec

Seth and Ken dig into a topic that was raised by a member of our Slack community. The initial half of the show reviews both the risks and dynamic or static review items associated with microservices. This is followed by a discussion that starts by asking the question "what are the must-have security features for a web application?"

Ken (@cktricky) and Seth (@sethlaw) take a step away from the news to review technical articles and research released in the last couple of weeks. This includes analysis done by Jerry Gamblin on total CVEs released during 2022, a new tool for exploiting weak CORS configurations, an excellent writeup on usage along with an intentionally-vulnerable GraphQL application, and finally some thoughts on prototype pollution style vulnerabilities in other interpreted languages (specifically python).

Frank Wang from dbtlabs (@ffwang2 on twitter) joins Seth and Ken for a discussion on current security landscape, artificial intelligence, and machine learning. Follow Frank on twitter or through his blog at https://franklyspeaking.substack.com/. Discussion starts with current breaches and how organizations approach security through their first security hire. This is followed by a discussion on AI related to ChatGPT and how it will affect security in the future.

@cktricky and @sethlaw host another episode starting with a lengthy discussion on security metrics spurred by a recent post by Leif Drezler (@leifdreizler). Security metrics are highly specific and custom to the organization and target audience, as evidenced by the lively discussion between the hosts. This is followed by a discussion of improvements in end-user security based on recent Apple iOS releases that change encryption and protection mechanisms for various services.

What do _you_ want for an AppSec Christmas! Another episode featuring Ken and Seth, for sure. The duo starts the conversation talking about useful AppSec and Security Blogs while featuring a recent GoLang Security post from Cole Cornford. Followed by an in-depth discussion on ChatGPT to welcome our new AI overlords. Finally, Seth and Ken both talk about what they wish to see this next year for AppSec-mas.

Going into the final month of 2022, the dynamic duo graces us with their presence. It begins with discussion of DNS Attacks based on Kaminsky-style attacks spurred by research presented at DeepSec by Timo Longen of Sec Consult. Followed by a conversation straight out of Slack about considerations involving organization and technical risks, specifically how to incorporate technical risk into organizational risk ratings. Finally, everyone is moving to Mastadon, but maybe they shouldn't be. Code is open source and there have been more than one flaw already identified in the service, although AppMap also shows how to use their tool to review Mastadon's source to sink interactions.

Ken and Seth break down the recently-released Immutable Laws of Security from Microsoft's Security Best Practices recommendations. Points of special interest being "Cybersecurity is a team sport", "Not keeping up is falling behind", and "Ruthless Prioritization is a survival skill".

Seth and Ken kickoff another unique discussion by looking at a recent scholarly paper on security bypasses and workarounds by health care workers. Followed by a demo of AppMap, a development tool that shows code traces based on dynamic use. Finally, a discussion of Portswigger's new Dastardly CI/CD tool and where it fits in the security SDLC.

What's that you say? There is no such thing as "done" with application security? Are our Sisyphean hosts (@cktricky and @sethlaw) therefore doomed to ever push this rock up the mountain, just to discuss ways to push it up again?

Back once again, Ken and Seth riff off of recent health discussions to talk about hacking health and maintaining a descent work/life balance. Discussion of recent Fortinet authorization issue and how to both search for and protect against flaws in COTS (commercial-off-the-shelf) products. To close out, a quick discussion on detecting custom secrets in source and using Github regexes to monitor for them.