Performing Security Headers Audit

Performing Security Headers Audit

Overview

Cybersecurity skill for performing security headers audit. Follows industry best practices and security standards.

When to Use

Trigger phrases:

• "performing security headers audit"

• "Auditing HTTP security headers including CSP, HSTS, X-Frame-Options, and cookie "

• During authorized web application security assessments as a standard configuration review

• When evaluating browser-level protections against XSS, clickjacking, and data leakage

• For compliance assessments requiring security header implementation (PCI DSS, SOC 2)

• When performing initial reconnaissance to identify easy-win security improvements

• During CI/CD pipeline security gate checks for new deployments

When NOT to Use

• When you lack proper authorization for testing
• For production systems without change management
• When the task requires legal or compliance expertise beyond technical scope

Prerequisites

• Authorization: Written scope for the target application (header review is low-risk)
• curl: For fetching response headers from target endpoints
• SecurityHeaders.com: Online scanner for quick header assessment
• Mozilla Observatory: Mozilla's web security testing tool
• Burp Suite: For comprehensive header analysis across multiple pages
• Browser DevTools: For examining headers and CSP violations in real-time

Workflow

# Example: IOC detection
import re

IOC_PATTERNS = {
    "ip": r"\b(?:\d{1,3}\.){3}\d{1,3}\b",
    "domain": r"\b[a-z0-9-]+\.[a-z]{2,}\b",
    "hash_md5": r"\b[a-f0-9]{32}\b",
    "hash_sha256": r"\b[a-f0-9]{64}\b",
}

def extract_iocs(text: str) -> dict:
    return {k: re.findall(v, text) for k, v in IOC_PATTERNS.items()}

1. Plan Operations — Define objectives, scope, and success criteria for security headers audit operations.
2. Prepare Environment — Set up tools, access, and data sources required for security headers audit.
3. Execute Core Workflow — Perform the security headers audit operations following established procedures.
4. Validate Results — Verify that results meet quality standards and objectives.
5. Report Findings — Document results, observations, and recommendations.
6. Follow Up — Track remediation actions and verify fixes where applicable.

Tools

• Analysis Platform — Data processing and visualization
• Collaboration Tools — Team coordination and knowledge sharing

Process

1. Reconnaissance — Gather target information, identify attack surface, enumerate services
2. Analysis/Exploitation — Execute the technique, analyze results, document findings
3. Reporting — Document IOCs, write findings, provide remediation recommendations

Verification

• All security headers audit procedures executed completely and documented
• Findings validated against multiple data sources
• False positives identified and filtered
• Results documented with evidence and timestamps
• Recommendations provided with risk-based prioritization

Anti-Rationalization Table