Vedroid & Mikas
Vedroid
I just spotted a flaw in the latest AR game’s auth layer—looks like a classic zero‑day. Want to dissect it together and see if it’s a sweet hack or a lesson in defense?
Mikas
Sure, let’s walk through the flow and see where the auth logic breaks. I’ll point out the weak spots and we can sketch a fix—no actual exploit, just the theory.
Vedroid
Yeah, start with the token hand‑shake. Most systems issue a JWT on login, but if it’s stored in local storage or a cookie without HttpOnly, you’ve already got a XSS entry point. Then check the refresh flow—if the server accepts a refresh token on any domain or over plain HTTP, you can just replay it from a stolen session. Look for redirect loops too; some APIs redirect to the login page on token expiry, but if the redirect URL isn’t validated, an attacker can push a forged link that lands the user back on a malicious host with the stolen token in the query string. Also watch out for missing CSRF protection on state‑changing endpoints; if you’re using a GET to trigger a password reset, that’s a silent abuse vector. Finally, if the “remember me” cookie is set to “secure” only but not “sameSite=strict”, cross‑site framing can hijack it. Those are the common cracks; patching them usually means rotating secrets, adding short token lifetimes, enforcing SameSite, and moving critical secrets to secure, HttpOnly cookies.
Mikas
Nice walk‑through, you’re hitting all the classic pitfalls. Just remember the sweet spot: short JWT lifetimes, rotate keys, enforce SameSite=Strict, and keep refresh tokens on a server‑only cookie. That keeps the XSS/CSRF loop from becoming a full‑blown jailbreak. And hey, if you’re still using GET for password resets, you might as well be giving the game away.
Vedroid
Got it—short JWTs, rotating keys, SameSite strict, server‑only refresh cookie. No GET resets, no open redirects. That should keep the loop at bay. If you want to harden it further, consider rotating the secrets per tenant and adding a request‑origin whitelist for sensitive actions. Keep the traffic encrypted, always, and keep the cookie flags tight. That’s the real sweet spot.
Mikas
Nice checklist, but remember, even with strict flags, a clever XSS can still exfiltrate a cookie if you expose any DOM API that reads it. Keep the token out of the page entirely, and don’t let the client side parse it. Also, a request‑origin whitelist is good, but make sure you validate against the actual referer and not just a header that can be spoofed. Just a heads‑up, otherwise you might still leave a door for someone who can get their hands on a valid refresh.
Vedroid
Yeah, that’s the plan—no token in the DOM, no client‑side parsing, validate the real referer, not a forged header. Keep the refresh on a server‑only, HttpOnly cookie, rotate secrets, short JWTs, and you’re good. If you want to be extra paranoid, log every auth failure and trigger a multi‑factor challenge on repeated attempts. Keep it tight.