AI has become a hot topic thanks to the recent headlines around the large language model (LLM) AI with a simple interface — ChatGPT. Since then, the AI field has been vibrant, with several major actors racing to provide ever-bigger, better, and more versatile models. Players like Microsoft, NVidia, Google, Meta, and open source projects have all published a list of new models. In fact, a leaked Google document makes it seem that these models will be ubiquitous and available to everyone soon.

An insecure direct object reference (IDOR) is a security vulnerability that occurs when a system’s implementation allows attackers to directly access and manipulate sensitive objects or resources without authorization checks. For example, an IDOR can arise when an application provides direct access to objects based on user-supplied input, allowing an attacker to bypass authorization.

An application’s attack surface is the sum of points where it might be vulnerable to bad actors. It consists of all the paths in and out of the application. Identifying vulnerabilities is vital to mitigating threats because any access point is a potential entry point for an attack. An attack surface analysis, which is critical to this mitigation strategy, is the process of identifying and assessing the potential vulnerabilities and risks in a software system or network.

Deserialization is the process of converting data from a serialized format, such as JSON or binary, back into its original form. Swift provides multiple protocols allowing users to convert objects and values to and from property lists, JSON, and other flat binary representations. Deserialization can also introduce unsuspecting security vulnerabilities in a user’s codebase that attackers could exploit.

Cross-site leaks (XS leaks) are a class of web security vulnerabilities that allow hackers to obtain sensitive information from a user’s browsing session on other websites or web apps. Modern web applications share data through various features and APIs — a function attackers can exploit to access this user data.

Infrastructure as code (IaC) has changed how we deploy and manage our cloud infrastructure. Instead of having to manually configure servers and networks with a large operations team, we can now define our service architecture through code. IaC allows us to automate infrastructure deployment, scale our entire fleet of servers, document a history of changes to our architecture, and test incremental changes to the network.

DevSecOps refers to the integration of security practices into DevOps process. With modern development cycles, you can't afford to leave security until the end. It should be baked in at every stage. Continuous integration, continuous delivery (CI/CD) security is a big part of the DevSecOps picture. It's critical that you secure your pipelines and that the automated systems used to implement CI/CD are not vulnerable to attack.

Session management security is an essential component of web application development. It safeguards user sessions and prevents unauthorized access. Managing sessions secures the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of sensitive user data. It also protects user privacy at large — which is essential to maintaining user trust in an application. When we manage sessions securely, we establish processes to destroy session tokens when users log out or their session ends.

Continuous integration (CI) and continuous delivery (CD) has become a ubiquitous practice for DevOps teams. The CI/CD process focuses on building and deploying new applications or releasing updates to already-deployed workloads. As a result, most CI/CD efforts focus on enhancing development speeds. However, CI/CD practices can accomplish much more than enabling workload deployments.

Webhooks are a callback integration technique for sending and receiving information, such as event notifications, in close to real-time. Webhooks can be triggered by application events and transmit data over HTTP to another application or third-party API. You can configure a webhook URL and connect external participants to customize, extend, or modify workflows. Webhooks may or may not be signed.