The document discusses various types of malicious hacking attacks on APIs, including SQL injection, XPath injection, code injection, log injection, XML external entity injection, cross-site scripting (XSS), denial-of-service (DoS) attacks, checking user permissions, malformed XML, XML bombs, malicious attachments, fuzzing scans, and custom scripting. It provides brief descriptions of each attack type and references additional resources on API security best practices.

1. Prevent Malicious
Hacking attacks on
your APIs
Michael Giller @GillerMichael

2. @GillerMichael
Security Scans Overview - Injection
 SQL Injection:
 tries to exploit bad database integration coding
 XPath Injection:
 tries to exploit bad XML processing inside your
target service

3. @GillerMichael
Security Scans Overview - Injection
 Code Injection:
 Watch out for those eval() functions!
 Log Injection
 Could be used to stir up false alarms
 XML External Entity Injection
 Vulnerabilities in XML parsing

4. @GillerMichael
Security Scans Overview - XSS
 Cross Site Scripting (XSS):
 enables attackers to inject client-side script into Web
pages viewed by other users.
 Used to bypass same origin policy
 Could be used to plant a Trojan horse, get full access to
user cookies and history, etc

5. @GillerMichael
Security Scans Overview - DoS
 Denial-of-Service (DoS) attack is an attempt
to make a machine or network resource
unavailable to its intended users
– E.g. CyberBunker launched an all-out assault, on a
spam-fighting company Spamhaus

6. @GillerMichael
Security Scans Overview
 Check user permissions:
 Make sure that your users can only access the
information they need to access
 Watch out for sequential IDs

7. @GillerMichael
Security Scans Overview (Cont.)
 Malformed XML:
 tries to exploit bad handling of invalid XML on your
server or in your service
 XML Bomb :
 tries to exploit bad handling of malicious XML
request (be careful)
 Malicious Attachment:
 tries to exploit bad handling of attached files

8. @GillerMichael
Security Scans Overview (Cont.)
 Fuzzing Scan:
 generates random input for specified request
parameters for a specified number of requests
 Custom Script:
 allows you to use a script for generating custom
parameter fuzzing values

9. References:
@GillerMichael
• SoapUI team had a great informational “Better Safe Than Sony”
webinar discussing security. You can watch it here:
 http://www.soapui.org/soapUI-News/watch-yesterdays-
webinar.html
• Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) published top
10 most common types of attacks here:
 https://www.owasp.org/index.php/OWASP_Top_Ten_Cheat_Sheet
• Here’s the attacks particular to REST:
 https://www.owasp.org/index.php/REST_Security_Cheat_Sheet