attack-surface.md

Attack Surface Analysis for jverdi/jvfloatlabeledtextfield

Attack Surface: Input Validation Bypass

• Description: Attackers bypass client-side input restrictions to submit malicious or invalid data to the server.
• jvfloatlabeledtextfield Contribution: The component's primary function is visual (the floating label). It relies on standard HTML attributes and potentially custom JavaScript for validation, both of which can be bypassed by an attacker. It does not inherently enforce server-side validation.
• Example: An attacker uses browser developer tools to remove the required attribute or change the type attribute of the input field, then submits invalid data.
• Impact:
  • Data corruption.
  • Application instability.
  • Potential for further attacks (e.g., SQL injection, XSS) if the server doesn't handle the invalid input.
• Risk Severity: High
• Mitigation Strategies:
  • Server-Side Validation: Mandatory comprehensive server-side validation of all input received. This is the critical defense. Validate data types, lengths, formats, and allowed values.
  • Input Sanitization: Sanitize all input on the server-side to prevent code injection attacks.
  • Server-Side Rendering of Validation Rules (Optional): If possible, render validation attributes (e.g., maxlength) from the server to make client-side tampering harder.

Attack Surface: Denial of Service (DoS) via Excessive Input

• Description: Attackers send excessively large input values to overwhelm server resources or cause application crashes.
• jvfloatlabeledtextfield Contribution: The component might use the maxlength HTML attribute, but this is a client-side only control. The component itself does not prevent an attacker from sending a large payload directly to the server (bypassing the client).
• Example: An attacker uses curl or a similar tool to send a POST request with an extremely long string in the text field, bypassing the client-side form and any maxlength attribute.
• Impact:
  • Server resource exhaustion (CPU, memory).
  • Application unavailability.
  • Potential database corruption.
• Risk Severity: High
• Mitigation Strategies:
  • Strict Server-Side Length Limits: Enforce strict and appropriate length limits on the server-side, completely independent of any client-side controls.
  • Rate Limiting: Implement rate limiting to prevent an attacker from flooding the server with requests, regardless of the size of the input.
  • Input Validation (Server-Side): Validate input size before any further processing.