8 Ways to Prevent SQL Injection Attacks
According to my previous blog, SQL injection attacks can affect your codes adversely. Well, it is rightly said that “Prevention Is Better Than Cure”. Here is how the SQL injection attack can be prevented.
In order to prevent SQL injection, the characters that are a matter of concern primarily are the double quote, single quote, and backslash characters. The double and single quotes can be interpreted as string delimiters without encoding, and the backslashes can be used to subvert any encoding which escapes string delimiters. The following blog brings you certain important aspects used for prevention.
1. Employ Comprehensive Data Sanitization
It is necessary for all the websites to filter all user input; the user data must get filtered for context. For an instance, email addresses should be filtered to allow only the characters allowed in an e-mail address, phone numbers should be filtered to allow only the characters allowed in a phone number and so on.
2. Use a Web Application Firewall
A most appropriate example for this can be the free, open source module, ModSecurity, which is available for Apache, Microsoft IIS, and nginx web servers. It offers a constantly evolving set of rules in order to filter the potentially dangerous web requests. The SQL database defences the ModSecurity helps to catch most of the attempts in order to sneak SQL through web channels.
3. Limit Database Privileges by Context
While creating multiple database user accounts, try to make it with the minimum levels of privilege for the usage environment. Let’s say, the code behind a login page should query the database using an account limited only to the relevant credentials table. This way, a breach through this channel cannot be leveraged to compromise the entire database.
4. Avoid Constructing SQL Queries with User Input
In order to avoid the data sanitization routines flaw, making use of SQL variable binding is safer when compared to constructing full queries. Using SQL variable with prepared statements or stored procedures is suggested for better work process.
5. Eliminate Unnecessary Database Capabilities
The database that is unnecessary and escalates the database privileges should be eliminated. Also, the database that has to spawn the command shells should get eliminated to avoid the easier SQL injection.
6. Regularly Apply Software Patches
Applying software patches on a regular basis as SQL injection vulnerabilities can be regularly identified in commercial software. When it comes to patching, it is very important to stay updated.
7. Suppress Error Messages
The error messages are the very important tool for the attackers and therefore it is suggested to keep them local if possible. When the external messages become necessary, it is advisable to keep them generic.
8. Monitor SQL Statements from Database-connected Applications
When the SQL statements are continuously monitored, it can help identify the rogue SQL statements and vulnerabilities.
Dev Information Technology Ltd. is a team of experts who can guide you through the SQL injection attack and its prevention. Contact our experts today!