Microsoft SDL Core Training Course

Day 1

IT Security and Secure Coding

• The nature of security
• Key IT security terminology
• Defining risk
• Various aspects of IT security
• Requirements across different application domains
• IT security versus secure coding
• From vulnerabilities to botnets and cybercrime
  • The nature of security flaws
  • Challenges in detection and remediation
  • From infected systems to targeted attacks
• Classification of security flaws
  • Landwehr’s taxonomy
  • The Seven Pernicious Kingdoms
  • OWASP Top Ten 2013
  • Comparison of OWASP Top Ten 2003 vs 2013

Introduction to the Microsoft® Security Development Lifecycle (SDL)

• Course agenda
• Applications under attack...
  • The evolution of cybercrime
  • The growing focus on application-level attacks
  • The prevalence of vulnerabilities in smaller ISV applications
• The origins of the Microsoft SDL...
  • Microsoft's security timeline...
  • Which applications are required to adhere to SDL?
• The Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle (SDL)
  • Overview of the Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle (SDL)
  • Pre-SDL Requirements: Security Training
  • Phase One: Requirements
  • Phase Two: Design
  • Phase Three: Implementation
  • Phase Four: Verification
  • Phase Five: Release – Response Plan
  • Phase Five: Release – Final Security Review
  • Phase Five: Release – Archive
  • Post-SDL Requirement: Response
  • SDL Process Guidance for Line of Business (LOB) Apps
  • SDL Guidance for Agile Methodologies
  • The need for process improvement in secure software development

Secure Design Principles

• Attack surface
  • Reducing the attack surface
  • Attack surface – illustrative example
  • Performing attack surface analysis
  • Examples of attack surface reduction
• Privacy
  • Privacy considerations
  • Understanding application behaviour and privacy concerns
• Defense in depth
  • Core SDL Principle: Defense in Depth
  • Defense in depth – illustrative example
• Least privilege principle
  • Least privilege – illustrative example
• Secure defaults
  • Secure defaults – illustrative examples

Secure Implementation Principles

• Section agenda
• Context: The Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle (SDL)
• Buffer overflow basics
  • Intel 80x86 Processors – key registers
  • Memory address layout
  • Function calling mechanisms in C/C++ on x86
  • Local variables and stack frames
  • Stack overflow
    • Buffer overflow on the stack
    • Introduction to exercises
    • Exercise: BOFIntro
    • Exercise: BOFIntro – Determining stack layout
    • Exercise: BOFIntro – Creating a simple exploit
• Input validation
  • Core concepts of input validation
  • Integer issues
    • Representation of negative integers
    • Integer overflow
    • Arithmetic overflow – predicting the output
    • Exercise: IntOverflow
    • Evaluating the value of Math.Abs(int.MinValue)
  • Mitigating integer issues
    • Strategies for mitigating integer problems
    • Preventing arithmetic overflow – addition
    • Preventing arithmetic overflow – multiplication
    • Detecting overflow using the checked keyword in C#
    • Exercise – Using the checked keyword in C#
    • Exceptions triggered by overflows in C#
  • Case study – Integer overflow in .NET
    • A real-world integer overflow vulnerability
    • Exploiting the integer overflow vulnerability
  • Path traversal vulnerability
    • Mitigating path traversal

Day 2

Secure Implementation Principles (Continued)

• Injection attacks
  • Common SQL Injection attack methods
  • Blind and time-based SQL injection
  • Protection methods against SQL Injection
  • Command injection
• Broken authentication and password management
  • Exercise – The weakness of hashed passwords
  • Password management and storage practices
  • Specialised hash algorithms for password storage
• Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
  • Understanding Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
  • CSS injection
  • Exploitation: Injection via other HTML tags
  • Preventing XSS
• Missing function level access control
  • Filtering file uploads
• Practical cryptography
  • Achieving confidentiality with symmetric cryptography
  • Symmetric encryption algorithms
  • Block ciphers – modes of operation
  • Hashing or message digests
  • Hash algorithms
  • Message Authentication Code (MAC)
  • Ensuring integrity and authenticity with symmetric keys
  • Achieving confidentiality with public-key encryption
  • Best practice – Safeguarding private keys
  • Common errors in password management
  • Exercise – Hard-coded passwords
  • Conclusion

Secure Verification Principles

• Functional testing versus security testing
• Identifying security vulnerabilities
• Prioritisation of risks
• Security testing within the SDLC
• Test planning steps (risk analysis)
• Scoping and information gathering
  • Identifying stakeholders
  • Identifying assets
  • Mapping the attack surface
  • Defining security testing objectives
• Threat modeling
  • Overview of threat modeling
  • Developing attacker profiles
  • Threat modeling using attack trees
  • Threat modeling based on misuse/abuse cases
  • Misuse/abuse cases – A simple web shop example
  • STRIDE per element approach to threat modeling – MS SDL
  • Identifying security objectives
  • Diagramming – Examples of DFD elements
  • Data flow diagrams – Example
  • Threat enumeration – MS SDL’s STRIDE and DFD elements
  • Risk analysis – Classifying threats
  • The DREAD threat/risk ranking model
• Security testing techniques and tools
  • General testing approaches
  • Techniques for different stages of the SDLC
• Code review
  • Code review for software security
  • Taint analysis
  • Heuristics
• Static code analysis
  • Overview of static code analysis
  • Exercise – Using static code analysis tools
• Testing the implementation
  • Manual run-time verification
  • Manual versus automated security testing
  • Penetration testing
  • Stress tests
• Fuzzing
  • Automated security testing via fuzzing
  • Challenges associated with fuzzing
• Web vulnerability scanners
  • Exercise – Using a vulnerability scanner
• Checking and hardening the environment
  • Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS)
  • Vulnerability scanners
  • Public vulnerability databases
• Case study – Forms Authentication Bypass
  • NULL byte termination vulnerability
  • The Forms Authentication Bypass vulnerability in the code
  • Exploiting the Forms Authentication Bypass

Knowledge Resources

• Secure coding resources – A starter kit
• Vulnerability databases
• .NET secure coding guidelines on MSDN
• .NET secure coding cheat sheets
• Recommended books – .NET and ASP.NET