Re: Safe session IDs (How about Hijacking)

From: Ryan M Harris (rmharrisat_private)
Date: Fri Jan 11 2002 - 13:13:36 PST

  • Next message: Glynn Clements: "Re: Safe session IDs"

    Ooh, and here's a good question.  Once I get it to the client, how can I
    make sure that it wasn't hijacked via man-in-the-middle or a sniffer on the
    client end?
    
    I used to use REMOTE_IP and REMOTE_USERAGENT stored on server end and
    compare to the value sent from the user.  But I need a way to ensure that
    the cookie wasn't grabbed on the way etc. now...
    
    Ryan
    
    ----- Original Message -----
    From: "Ryan M Harris" <rmharrisat_private>
    To: "Josh Daymont" <joshdat_private>; "Hector Herrera"
    <hectorhat_private>; "Giorgio Zoppi" <denebat_private>;
    <secprogat_private>
    Sent: Friday, January 11, 2002 11:45 AM
    Subject: Re: Safe session IDs
    
    
    > First of all thank you all for the help.  I sent a reply directly only to
    > people who had mentioned something that I can't use, and gave a reason.
    >
    > I see I have to make myself a little more clear.  Unfortunately because of
    > specification restraints I must rely on generating a unique, unpredictable
    > number on ANY operating system and I cannot expect the user to install 3rd
    > party randomizers hardware or software (such as Yarrow, though it looks
    > good).
    >
    > 1) It must be written in PHP but because of the features I need I can't
    use
    > its built in session handler.
    > 2) I cannot rely on /dev/urandom because windows does not support that.
    > 3) Microtime() returns time() + microseconds since last second
    > 4) The MD5 is for mangling of the data just so it is harder to guess also
    > serves as a convenient way of ensureing safe passing via browser.
    >
    > Based on these constraints, is there a good way of doing this?  I could
    use
    > a built in PHP function called UniqID, but it seems to only be md5(rand())
    >
    >
    > Ryan
    >
    >
    



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