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Database security testing is done to find the loopholes in security mechanisms and also about finding the vulnerabilities or weaknesses of database system.

The main target of database security testing is to find out vulnerabilities in a system and to determine whether its data and resources are protected from potential intruders. Security testing defines a way to identify potential vulnerabilities effectively, when performed regularly.

Given below are the primary objectives of performing database security testing −

• Authentication
• Authorization
• Confidentiality
• Availability
• Integrity
• Resilience

Types of Threats on a Database System

SQL Injection

This is most common type of attack in a database system where malicious SQL statements are inserted in the database system and are executed to get critical information from the database system. This attack takes advantage of loopholes in implementation of user applications. To prevent this, user inputs fields should be carefully handled.

Privilege Elevation in Database

In this attack, a user already has some access in the database system and he only tries to elevate this access higher level so that he/she can perform some unauthorized activities in database system.

Denial of Service

In this type of attack, an attacker makes a database system or application resource unavailable to its legitimate users. Applications can also be attacked in ways that render the application, and sometimes the entire machine, unusable.

Unauthorized Access to data

Another type of attack is gaining unauthorized access to data within an application or database system. Unauthorized access includes −

• Unauthorized access to data via user based applications
• Unauthorized access to by monitoring the access of others
• Unauthorized access to reusable client authentication information

Identity Spoofing

In Identity Spoofing, a hacker uses the credentials of a user or device to launch attacks against network hosts, steal data or bypass access controls to database system. Preventing this attack requires IT-infrastructure and network-level mitigations.

Data Manipulation

In a data manipulation attack, a hacker changes data to gain some advantage or to damage the image of database owners.

Database Security Testing Techniques

Penetration Testing

A penetration test is an attack on a computer system with the intention of finding security loopholes, potentially gaining access to it, its functionality and data.

Risk Finding

Risk Finding is a process of assessing and deciding on the risk involved with the type of loss and the possibility of vulnerability occurrence. This is determined within the organization by various interviews, discussions and analysis.

SQL Injection Test

It involves checking the user inputs in application fields. For example, entering a special character like ‘,’ or ‘;’ in any text box in a user application should not be allowed. When a database error occurs, it means that the user input is inserted in some query, which is then executed by the application. In such a case, the application is vulnerable to SQL injection.

These attacks are a big threat to data as the attackers can get access to important information from the server database. To check SQL injection entry points into your web application, find out code from your code base where direct MySQL queries are executed on the database by accepting some user inputs.

SQL Injection Testing can be performed for Brackets, Commas, and Quotation marks.

Password Cracking

This is the most important check while performing database system testing. To access critical information, hackers can use a password-cracking tool or can guess a common username/password. These common passwords are easily available on internet and also password cracking tools exist freely.

Therefore, it is necessary to check at the time of testing if the password policy is maintained in the system. In case of any banking and finance applications, there is a need to set a strict password policy on all the critical information database systems.

Security Audit of Database System

A security audit is a process of evaluating company’s security policies at a regular time interval to determine whether necessary standards are followed or not. Various security standards can be followed as per business requirement to define the security policy and then assessment of set policies against those standards can be done.

Example of most common security standards are ISO 27001, BS15999, etc.

Database Security Testing Tools

There are various system testing tools available in market, which can be used to test OS and application check. Some of the most common tools are discussed below.

Zed Attack Proxy

It is a penetration-testing tool for finding vulnerabilities in web applications. It is designed to be used by people with a wide range of security experience and as such is ideal for developers and functional testers who are new to penetration testing. It is commonly used for Windows, Linux, Mac OS.

Paros

All HTTP and HTTPS data between server and client, including cookies and form fields, can be intercepted and modified using these scanners. It is used for Cross-platform, Java JRE/JDK 1.4.2 or above.

Social Engineer Toolkit

It is an open source tool and human elements are attacked rather than the system element. It enables you to send emails, java applets etc. containing the attack code. It is preferred for Linux, Apple Mac OS X and Microsoft Windows.

Skipfish

This tool is used to scan their sites for vulnerabilities. Reports generated by the tool are meant to serve as a foundation for professional web application security assessments. It is preferred for Linux, FreeBSD, MacOS X, and Windows.

Vega

It is an open source, multiplatform web security tool that is used to find instances of SQL injection, cross-site scripting (XSS), and other vulnerabilities in web applications. It is preferred for Java, Linux, and Windows.

Wapiti

Wapiti is an open source and web-based tool that scans the web pages of the web application and check for scripts and forms where it can inject data. It is built with Python and can detect File handling errors, Database, XSS, LDAP and CRLF injections, Command execution detection.

Web Scarab

It is written in Java and is used for analyzing the applications that communicate through HTTP/HTTPS protocols. This tool is primarily designed for developers who can write code themselves. This tool is not OS dependent.

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