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CITI compromise - not really that tricky

Just read a little about the reported CITI bank compromise. It seems the attackers were able to Authenticate (assuming they used compromised credentials) and then modify the account number in the URL to be able to access other accounts.

The fact that a major bank had this type of vulnerability in one of there main customer facing systems is shocking. This type of vulnerability is one of the standard things that a security assessment team should have found, documented, and resolved (hopefully before the application was ever allowed to be turned on to face the public). This isn't a sophisticated SQL injection attack or obscure software vulnerability that required hours of coding to be able to detect and then exploit.

If you happen to be someone who works on external facing web sites, or an Information Security professional - please check the OWASP web site.
The OWASP project (Open Web Application Security Project) has been around for a while and has a lot of very good resources on leading practices to secure web sites, common vulnerabilities in web sites, and how to manage and deploy web applications securely.

This attack would fall under #3 of their top 10 vulnerabilities.
https://www.owasp.org/index.php/Top_10_2010-A3

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