Book Image

SQL Injection Strategies

By : Ettore Galluccio, Edoardo Caselli, Gabriele Lombari
Book Image

SQL Injection Strategies

By: Ettore Galluccio, Edoardo Caselli, Gabriele Lombari

Overview of this book

SQL injection (SQLi) is probably the most infamous attack that can be unleashed against applications on the internet. SQL Injection Strategies is an end-to-end guide for beginners looking to learn how to perform SQL injection and test the security of web applications, websites, or databases, using both manual and automated techniques. The book serves as both a theoretical and practical guide to take you through the important aspects of SQL injection, both from an attack and a defense perspective. You’ll start with a thorough introduction to SQL injection and its impact on websites and systems. Later, the book features steps to configure a virtual environment, so you can try SQL injection techniques safely on your own computer. These tests can be performed not only on web applications but also on web services and mobile applications that can be used for managing IoT environments. Tools such as sqlmap and others are then covered, helping you understand how to use them effectively to perform SQL injection attacks. By the end of this book, you will be well-versed with SQL injection, from both the attack and defense perspective.
Table of Contents (11 chapters)
1
Section 1: (No)SQL Injection in Theory
4
Section 2: SQL Injection in Practice

Attacking traditional web applications – automated techniques

As we mentioned earlier, besides performing manual attack techniques to exploit SQL injection, it's possible to use specific software that can handle some of the tasks involved in SQL injection attacks, producing useful results in a timely manner. These tools are used by both attackers and security professionals alike, as they optimize operations and help to save a lot of time by simplifying the tasks we need to perform.

First, we will go through what is possible to do, in terms of SQL injection, with Zed Attack Proxy (ZAP), which is the attack proxy by OWASP.

OWASP ZAP for SQL injection

OWASP ZAP is a versatile tool that consists of an attack proxy—a piece of software that is used to intercept traffic in order to monitor it or modify it before it's sent to an application—with other functionalities that help to automate the process. In this sense, through automation, this tool can...