How does HTTP request smuggling work?
HTTP request smuggling is an attack technique that is conducted by interfering with the processing of requests between the front end and back end servers. The attacker exploits the vulnerability by modifying the request to include another request in the first request’s body.
What is a Desync attack?
This attack is known as HTTP Desync and was detailed in an article by James Kettle of PortSwigger in August. It is part of the class of attacks known as HTTP request smuggling attacks. These attacks exploit the processes that web application back-end servers use to handle multiple requests from one or more users.
What is the difference between HTTP and https?
In a Nutshell HTTPS is HTTP with encryption. The difference between the two protocols is that HTTPS uses TLS (SSL) to encrypt normal HTTP requests and responses. As a result, HTTPS is far more secure than HTTP. A website that uses HTTP has HTTP:// in its URL, while a website that uses HTTPS has HTTPS://.
What is the purpose of HTTP request smuggling?
Request smuggling vulnerabilities are often critical in nature, allowing an attacker to bypass security controls, gain unauthorized access to sensitive data, and directly compromise other application users. HTTP request smuggling was first documented in 2005, and recently repopularized by PortSwigger’s research on the topic.
Is there a way to prevent request smuggling?
Runtime platforms such as Node.js have used this solution to remediate against request smuggling where any requests with both headers are returned with an HTTP 400 response. Snyk believes this technique to be an ideal fix to prevent smuggling issues.
How to smuggle content into an HTTP request?
This popular technique discovered by James Kettle of PortSwigger labs involves placing a Content-Length header and a Transfer-Encoding header in a single HTTP request and manipulating it in a way where a frontend proxy and backend server will prioritize these headers and process the smuggled request differently.
Can a request be smuggled into another website?
Since the second Content-Length was set to zero, the backend will expect no request body and the /reqsmuggle request is treated as another pipelined request. As such, the response of this smuggled request could be received by another user.