Bug Bounty Projects

Bug Bounty Program for OWASP projects

Introduction

Many developers and companies looking to implement security are turning towards OWASP to use Defender libraries that they can implement to secure their critical applications. Since this implies a form of trust in OWASP, many users of these projects might forget or not be aware that many of them are Open Source and lack an expected security assurance review, which at the moment is not done by OWASP.

Testing web applications for security can be a challenging task. But testing that security control libraries are robust in the face of attack is an even more difficult challenge for even the most sophistical assessment professionals.

After a tender process to select a service Bug Bounty Program provider that took place from February till April 2016 , BugCrowd was selected by OWASP for conducting a Bug Bounty Program for specific OWASP projects.

BugCrowd provides their platform and services to allow OWASP projects conduct specific Bug Bounty programs for Defender category projects but also, any other Code Project that needs to be installed and could create vulnerabilities in the installed computer.

Projects that are vulnerable in nature, such as WebGoat, are not part of this initiative. Projects that are not mature enough , such as alpha releases should also not participate in the program.

Bounty programs as a form of Quality Assurance

The purpose of the Bug Bounty is to provide a platform for stable and mature defender projects as a form of Quality assurance.

Bug Bounty Program Process

A project that wants to be part of the bug bounty should fulfill the following criteria:

• It must be a Code Project
• Should be part of a defender category
• Should have a stable and mature release version (according to the [COCOMO model])
• Project must present the results of a recent automated scan of their code using available DAST or SAST tool (Coverity, SWAMP or any other)
• If the project is a library, project leader should provide a site protected by the library in question

Scope

In order to define the bounties, first, the scope needs to be defined. As part of this initiative, Johanna Curiel is collaborating with project leaders to provide a setup and an QA environment for the Bug Hunters to test on.

The following is a defined scope for the Bug Bounty Program for OWASP CRSFGuard: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1eTH5lD9MK93ik0vgV0YP0O_jh-DXz2-JbRjZxCS23g0/edit?usp=sharing

Next

If you are project leader that wants your project to be part of the Bug Bounty please contact johanna.curiel[at]owasp.org and Claudia.Aviles-Casanovas[at]owasp.org