Web Security News

Mozilla previews Firefox browser with XSS blocking filter

Tuesday, October 6, 2009

Mozilla's popular Firefox web browser will soon feature a technology called Content Security Policy which the company said would block cross-site scripting (XSS) hacker attacks from websites injected with malicious code.

The new feature is available for preview for security researchers and developers, Mozilla's security manager Brandon Sterne said in a post Monday on the Mozilla blog.

In an earlier blog post, Sterne explained that CSP can filter out malicious code used in XSS attacks by requiring that all JavaScript for a page be loaded from an external file and served from an explicitly approved host.

This means that only script from an approved host will be treated as valid and all other content will be blocked.

"The bottom line is that it will be extremely difficult to mount a successful XSS attack against a site with CSP enabled," Sterne explained. "All common vectors for script injection will no longer work and the bar for a successful attack is placed much, much higher."

For CSP to be effective at blocking hacker attacks, Mozilla must convince website developers to adopt the new technology in building their sites.
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