Site security audit is a set of measures aimed at eliminating software vulnerabilities in the site structure. Such vulnerabilities open up access to three opportunities:

• penetration to closed confidential information, for example, logins and passwords of personal accounts, the content of closed databases;

• unauthorized administration and moderation of the site;

• disruption of the site (slowdown, spamming, incorrect links, the disappearance of some pages, etc.), up to a complete collapse.

A site security audit is essentially an organization of protection against hacker attacks, unauthorized hacking, and malware injection into the system. This is a time-consuming task. After all, to carry out a hack, it is enough to find one vulnerability, and here it is necessary to identify all possible vulnerabilities. Of course, even this will not give one hundred percent guarantee against the problems listed above, since there is no absolute protection.

Only potential attack vectors can be taken into account, but not all possible options. Also, viruses, Trojans, and malware are on the move. Something new appears every day. That is why any company will not provide security guarantees for more than six months. Accordingly, if the client is interested in the stable uninterrupted operation of the site, then in an amicable way, the site security audit should be carried out at least once every 7-8 months. It is believed that conducting such an audit less than once a year reduces security by about 30%.

The security of a resource can be at risk for various reasons:

• a very common option is competitors, many companies do not hesitate to wage such a hidden war on the Internet

• another option is a bit conspiratorial – antivirus developers, and the companies themselves that improve the security of sites, themselves create the reason for their increased demand

• the third option combines spontaneous hacker attacks, when the desired site is not the target, but simply “falls under the distribution”

• the fourth option is a banal theft, only in the online version, for example, when profits are stolen from online stores

Standard Site Security Audit Scheme

It is important to emphasize that high site security will not give 100% protection. However, with a possible attack, a well-protected resource will suffer much less. Site security audit includes the following components:

Simulated attack. One of the best options for identifying a security breach would be to create a hacking environment, simulate a hacker attack. Of course, such an attack will not bring any real harm to the resource, but it is carried out in real-time with a fully involved site, which brings the conditions closer to the real ones. Attack scripts are updated in parallel with the emergence of new viruses and hacking methods. This allows you to assess the overall security of the web resource.

Site code monitoring. It does a comprehensive analysis of plugins and scripts, especially plugins. What is it about? The structure of the site and its functioning are too complex to be described in machine code (low-level programming language). For this, a high-level programming language is used. Basically, scripts and plugins are programs that control other, simpler programs. Among the objects of the high-level programming language, there are many very famous ones: JavaScript, Pascal, 1C, PHP (this scripting language is actively used to create web applications), etc. Even though the high-level programming language is versatile, few high-level programs, as a rule, associated with calculations and data processing, are completely independent in the site structure. Others, when working, are forced to constantly access the kernel of the operating system. However, high-level programs are not tailored for any particular OS. This possible inconsistency in the code is one potential breach. Among the scripts and plugins, plugins were highlighted for a reason, because in case of problems with scripts, the program will display an error message. A plug-in malfunction can lead to more serious segmentation errors when access to non-writable areas of computer memory occurs, or when trying to change memory outside the protocol.

A logical continuation is a detailed analysis of third-party products that are used on the site. Hackers often exploit emerging conflicts between such programs and the OS.

Then the publication is tested. The security of a website has often been compromised since its inception. The reason for this is the publicly available backup files and system files.