Enhancing Security and Reliability in Landing

The devlog-ist/landing project focuses on creating a streamlined landing experience. Recent efforts have concentrated on bolstering its security and reliability, addressing several key vulnerabilities identified through code review and testing.

Addressing Security Vulnerabilities

Several security flaws were identified and rectified. These included Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities, potential SQL injection points, and a critical race condition during slug generation. Each fix was carefully implemented to minimize disruption while maximizing protection.

Preventing XSS

XSS vulnerabilities were addressed by ensuring proper output encoding using e() escaping in the Filament HTML preview. This prevents malicious scripts from being injected into the rendered HTML.

<?php

echo e($unsafe_variable);

?>

Hardening Against SQL Injection

SQL injection risks were mitigated by implementing integer casts when using DB::raw(). This ensures that only numeric values are passed to the database, preventing potential code execution.

<?php

$id = (int) $unsafe_id;
DB::raw("SELECT * FROM table WHERE id = {$id}");

?>

Resolving Slug Race Conditions

A race condition during slug creation was resolved by implementing retry logic when a UniqueConstraintViolationException is caught. This ensures that unique slugs are consistently generated, even under high load.

<?php

use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;
use Illuminate\Support\Str;
use Illuminate\Database\UniqueConstraintViolationException;

class MyModel extends Model
{
    public static function createUniqueSlug(string $title, int $maxAttempts = 10): string
    {
        $slug = Str::slug($title);
        $originalSlug = $slug;

        for ($i = 1; $i <= $maxAttempts; $i++) {
            try {
                // Attempt to create a new record with the generated slug
                return $slug;
            } catch (UniqueConstraintViolationException $e) {
                // If a unique constraint violation occurs, append a number and try again
                $slug = $originalSlug . '-' . $i;
            }
        }

        throw new \Exception('Could not generate unique slug after ' . $maxAttempts . ' attempts.');
    }
}

?>

Enhancing Reliability

Reliability improvements included addressing a browser process leak in the diagram renderer, ensuring silent failures in token recording are properly logged, and enhancing the LinkedIn job with comprehensive testing.

Browser Process Leak

A browser process leak in the diagram renderer was fixed by implementing a try/finally block to ensure resources are always released, even if exceptions occur.

Token Recording Failures

Silent failures in token recording were addressed by wrapping the recording logic in a try/catch block with appropriate logging. This ensures that any errors during token recording are captured and investigated.

LinkedIn Job Testing

The LinkedIn job was fortified with eight new tests to improve its reliability and ensure it functions as expected under various conditions.

Dependency Updates

An Axios vulnerability was addressed by updating the library from version 1.13.2 to 1.13.5, incorporating the latest security patches.

Conclusion

By addressing these security and reliability issues, the devlog-ist/landing project has significantly improved its overall robustness and resilience. These enhancements contribute to a more secure and dependable landing experience for users.