IIS 8.5 Server Security Technical Implementation Guide

Logging onto a web server remotely using an unencrypted protocol or service when performing updates and maintenance is a major risk. Data, such as user account, is transmitted in plaintext and can easily be compromised. When performing remote administrative tasks, a protocol or service that encrypts the communication channel must be used. An alternative to remote administration of the web server is to perform web server administration locally at the console. Local administration at the console implies physical access to the server.

Log files are a critical component to the successful management of an IS used within the DoD. By generating log files with useful information web administrators can leverage them in the event of a disaster, malicious attack, or other site specific needs. Ascertaining the correct order of the events that occurred is important during forensic analysis. Events that appear harmless by themselves might be flagged as a potential threat when properly viewed in sequence. By also establishing the event date and time, an event can be properly viewed with an enterprise tool to fully see a possible threat in its entirety. Without sufficient information establishing when the log event occurred, investigation into the cause of event is severely hindered. Log record content that may be necessary to satisfy the requirement of this control includes, but is not limited to, time stamps, source and destination IP addresses, user/process identifiers, event descriptions, application-specific events, success/fail indications, file names involved, access control, or flow control rules invoked. Satisfies: SRG-APP-000092-WSR-000055, SRG-APP-000093-WSR-000053, SRG-APP-000095-WSR-000056, SRG-APP-000096-WSR-000057, SRG-APP-000097-WSR-000058, SRG-APP-000097-WSR-000059

Internet Information Services (IIS) on Windows Server 2012 provides basic logging capabilities. However, because IIS takes some time to flush logs to disk, administrators do not have access to logging information in real-time. In addition, text-based log files can be difficult and time-consuming to process. In IIS 8.5, the administrator has the option of sending logging information to Event Tracing for Windows (ETW). This option gives the administrator the ability to use standard query tools, or create custom tools, for viewing real-time logging information in ETW. This provides a significant advantage over parsing text-based log files that are not updated in real time. Satisfies: SRG-APP-000092-WSR-000055, SRG-APP-000108-WSR-000166, SRG-APP-000358-WSR-000063

Web server logging capability is critical for accurate forensic analysis. Without sufficient and accurate information, a correct replay of the events cannot be determined. Ascertaining the correct source, e.g. source IP, of the events is important during forensic analysis. Correctly determining the source of events will add information to the overall reconstruction of the logable event. By determining the source of the event correctly, analysis of the enterprise can be undertaken to determine if events tied to the source occurred in other areas within the enterprise. A web server behind a load balancer or proxy server, when not configured correctly, will record the load balancer or proxy server as the source of every logable event. When looking at the information forensically, this information is not helpful in the investigation of events. The web server must record with each event the client source of the event.

Web server logging capability is critical for accurate forensic analysis. Without sufficient and accurate information, a correct replay of the events cannot be determined. Ascertaining the success or failure of an event is important during forensic analysis. Correctly determining the outcome will add information to the overall reconstruction of the logable event. By determining the success or failure of the event correctly, analysis of the enterprise can be undertaken to determine if events tied to the event occurred in other areas within the enterprise. Without sufficient information establishing the success or failure of the logged event, investigation into the cause of event is severely hindered. The success or failure also provides a means to measure the impact of an event and help authorized personnel to determine the appropriate response. Log record content that may be necessary to satisfy the requirement of this control includes, but is not limited to, time stamps, source and destination IP addresses, user/process identifiers, event descriptions, application-specific events, success/fail indications, file names involved, access control, or flow control rules invoked.

Web server logging capability is critical for accurate forensic analysis. Without sufficient and accurate information, a correct replay of the events cannot be determined. Determining user accounts, processes running on behalf of the user, and running process identifiers also enable a better understanding of the overall event. User tool identification is also helpful to determine if events are related to overall user access or specific client tools. Log record content that may be necessary to satisfy the requirement of this control includes: time stamps, source and destination addresses, user/process identifiers, event descriptions, success/fail indications, file names involved, and access control or flow control rules invoked.

A major tool in exploring the website use, attempted use, unusual conditions, and problems are the access and error logs. In the event of a security incident, these logs can provide the SA and the web manager with valuable information. Failure to protect log files could enable an attacker to modify the log file data or falsify events to mask an attacker's activity.

Protection of log data includes assuring log data is not accidentally lost or deleted. Backing up log records to an unrelated system or onto separate media than the system the web server is actually running on helps to assure that, in the event of a catastrophic system failure, the log records will be retained.

User management and authentication can be an essential part of any application hosted by the web server. Along with authenticating users, the user management function must perform several other tasks like password complexity, locking users after a configurable number of failed logons, and management of temporary and emergency accounts; and all of this must be done enterprise-wide. The web server contains a minimal user management function, but the web server user management function does not offer enterprise-wide user management, and user management is not the primary function of the web server. User management for the hosted applications should be done through a facility that is built for enterprise-wide user management, like LDAP and Active Directory.

A web server can provide many features, services, and processes. Some of these may be deemed unnecessary or too unsecure to run on a production DoD system. The web server must provide the capability to disable, uninstall, or deactivate functionality and services that are deemed to be non-essential to the web server mission or can adversely impact server performance.

A web server should be primarily a web server or a proxy server but not both, for the same reasons that other multi-use servers are not recommended. Scanning for web servers that will also proxy requests into an otherwise protected network is a very common attack making the attack anonymous.

When accounts used for web server features such as documentation, sample code, example applications, tutorials, utilities, and services are created even though the feature is not installed, they become an exploitable threat to a web server. These accounts become inactive, are not monitored through regular use, and passwords for the accounts are not created or updated. An attacker, through very little effort, can use these accounts to gain access to the web server and begin investigating ways to elevate the account privileges. The accounts used for web server features not installed must not be created and must be deleted when these features are uninstalled.

Just as running unneeded services and protocols is a danger to the web server at the lower levels of the OSI model, running unneeded utilities and programs is also a danger at the application layer of the OSI model. Office suites, development tools, and graphical editors are examples of such programs that are troublesome. Individual productivity tools have no legitimate place or use on an enterprise, production web server and they are also prone to their own security risks. The web server installation process must provide options allowing the installer to choose which utility programs, services, and modules are to be installed or removed. By having a process for installation and removal, the web server is guaranteed to be in a more stable and secure state than if these services and programs were installed and removed manually.

Controlling what a user of a hosted application can access is part of the security posture of the web server. Any time a user can access more functionality than is needed for the operation of the hosted application poses a security issue. A user with too much access can view information that is not needed for the user's job role, or the user could use the function in an unintentional manner. A MIME tells the web server what type of program, various file types, and extensions are and what external utilities or programs are needed to execute the file type. A shell is a program that serves as the basic interface between the user and the operating system, so hosted application users must not have access to these programs. Shell programs may execute shell escapes and can then perform unauthorized activities that could damage the security posture of the web server.

A web server can be installed with functionality that, just by its nature, is not secure. Web Distributed Authoring (WebDAV) is an extension to the HTTP protocol that, when developed, was meant to allow users to create, change, and move documents on a server, typically a web server or web share. Allowing this functionality, development, and deployment is much easier for web authors. WebDAV is not widely used and has serious security concerns because it may allow clients to modify unauthorized files on the web server.

This check verifies the server certificate is actually a DoD-issued certificate used by the organization being reviewed. This is used to verify the authenticity of the website to the user. If the certificate is not issued by the DoD or if the certificate has expired, then there is no assurance the use of the certificate is valid. The entire purpose of using a certificate is, therefore, compromised.

Mobile code in hosted applications allows the developer to add functionality and displays to hosted applications that are fluid, as opposed to a static web page. The data presentation becomes more appealing to the user, is easier to analyze, and navigation through the hosted application and data is much less complicated. Some mobile code technologies in use in today's applications are: Java, JavaScript, ActiveX, PDF, Postscript, Shockwave movies, Flash animations, and VBScript. The DoD has created policies that define the usage of mobile code on DoD systems. The usage restrictions and implementation guidance apply to both the selection and use of mobile code installed on organizational servers and mobile code downloaded and executed on individual workstations. Source code for a Java program is, many times, stored in files with either .java or .jpp file extensions. From the .java and .jpp files the Java compiler produces a binary file with an extension of .class. The .java or .jpp file could therefore reveal sensitive information regarding an application's logic and permissions to resources on the server.

The separation of user functionality from web server management can be accomplished by moving management functions to a separate IP address or port. To further separate the management functions, separate authentication methods and certificates should be used. By moving the management functionality, the possibility of accidental discovery of the management functions by non-privileged users during hosted application use is minimized.

Cookies are used to exchange data between the web server and the client. Cookies, such as a session cookie, may contain session information and user credentials used to maintain a persistent connection between the user and the hosted application since HTTP/HTTPS is a stateless protocol. Cookies associate session information with client information for the duration of a user’s connection to a website. Using cookies is a more efficient way to track session state than any of the methods that do not use cookies because cookies do not require any redirection.

ASP.NET provides a session state, which is available as the HttpSessionState class, as a method of storing session-specific information that is visible only within the session. ASP.NET session state identifies requests from the same browser during a limited time window as a session, and provides the ability to persist variable values for the duration of that session. Cookies associate session information with client information for the duration of a user’s connection to a website. Using cookies is a more efficient way to track session state than any of the methods that do not use cookies because cookies do not require any redirection.

Making certain that the web server has not been updated by an unauthorized user is always a concern. Adding patches, functions, and modules that are untested and not part of the baseline opens the possibility for security risks. The web server must offer, and not hinder, a method that allows for the quick and easy reinstallation of a verified and patched baseline to guarantee the production web server is up-to-date and has not been modified to add functionality or expose security risks. When the web server does not offer a method to roll back to a clean baseline, external methods, such as a baseline snapshot or virtualizing the web server, can be used.

The Machine Key element of the ASP.NET web.config specifies the algorithm and keys that ASP.NET will use for encryption. The Machine Key feature can be managed to specify hashing and encryption settings for application services such as view state, forms authentication, membership and roles, and anonymous identification. Ensuring a strong encryption method can mitigate the risk of data tampering in crucial functional areas such as forms authentication cookies, or view state.

Directory browsing allows the contents of a directory to be displayed upon request from a web client. If directory browsing is enabled for a directory in IIS, users could receive a web page listing the contents of the directory. If directory browsing is enabled the risk of inadvertently disclosing sensitive content is increased.

The indexing service can be used to facilitate a search function for websites. Enabling indexing may facilitate a directory traversal exploit and reveal unwanted information to a malicious user. Indexing must be limited to web document directories only.

HTTP error pages contain information that could enable an attacker to gain access to an information system. Failure to prevent the sending of HTTP error pages with full information to remote requesters exposes internal configuration information to potential attackers.

Remote access to the web server is any access that communicates through an external, non-organization-controlled network. Remote access can be used to access hosted applications or to perform management functions. A web server can be accessed remotely and must be capable of restricting access from what the DoD defines as nonsecure zones. Nonsecure zones are defined as any IP, subnet, or region that is defined as a threat to the organization. The nonsecure zones must be defined for public web servers logically located in a DMZ, as well as private web servers with perimeter protection devices. By restricting access from nonsecure zones, through internal web server access list, the web server can stop or slow denial of service (DoS) attacks on the web server.

During an attack on the web server or any of the hosted applications, the system administrator may need to disconnect or disable access by users to stop the attack. The web server must provide a capability to disconnect users to a hosted application without compromising other hosted applications unless deemed necessary to stop the attack. Methods to disconnect or disable connections are to stop the application service for a specified hosted application, stop the web server, or block all connections through web server access list. The web server capabilities used to disconnect or disable users from connecting to hosted applications and the web server must be documented to make certain that, during an attack, the proper action is taken to conserve connectivity to any other hosted application if possible and to make certain log data is conserved for later forensic analysis.

This check verifies the key web server system configuration files are owned by the SA or the web administrator controlled account. These same files that control the configuration of the web server, and thus its behavior, must also be accessible by the account running the web service. If these files are altered by a malicious user, the web server would no longer be under the control of its managers and owners; properties in the web server configuration could be altered to compromise the entire server platform.

In order to make certain that the logging mechanism used by the web server has sufficient storage capacity in which to write the logs, the logging mechanism needs to be able to allocate log record storage capacity. The task of allocating log record storage capacity is usually performed during initial installation of the logging mechanism. The system administrator will usually coordinate the allocation of physical drive space with the web server administrator along with the physical location of the partition and disk. Refer to NIST SP 800-92 for specific requirements on log rotation and storage dependent on the impact of the web server.

A web server can be modified through parameter modification, patch installation, upgrades to the web server or modules, and security parameter changes. With each of these changes, there is the potential for an adverse effect such as a DoS, web server instability, or hosted application instability. To limit changes to the web server and limit exposure to any adverse effects from the changes, files such as the web server application files, libraries, and configuration files must have permissions and ownership set properly to only allow privileged users access. The key web service administrative and configuration tools must only be accessible by the web server staff. All users granted this authority will be documented and approved by the ISSO. Access to the IIS Manager will be limited to authorized users and administrators. Satisfies: SRG-APP-000380-WSR-000072, SRG-APP-000435-WSR-000147, SRG-APP-000033-WSR-000169

Web servers provide numerous processes, features, and functionalities that utilize TCP/IP ports. Some of these processes may be deemed unnecessary or too unsecure to run on a production system. The web server must provide the capability to disable or deactivate network-related services that are deemed to be non-essential to the server mission, are too unsecure, or are prohibited by the PPSM CAL and vulnerability assessments.

The use of Internet Printing Protocol (IPP) on an IIS web server allows client’s access to shared printers. This privileged access could allow remote code execution by increasing the web servers attack surface. Additionally, since IPP does not support SSL, it is considered a risk and will not be deployed.

A Denial of Service (DoS) can occur when the web server is so overwhelmed that it can no longer respond to additional requests. A web server not properly tuned may become overwhelmed and cause a DoS condition even with expected traffic from users. To avoid a DoS, the web server must be tuned to handle the expected traffic for the hosted applications.

The HTTP protocol is a stateless protocol. To maintain a session, a session identifier is used. The session identifier is a piece of data that is used to identify a session and a user. If the session identifier is compromised by an attacker, the session can be hijacked. By encrypting the session identifier, the identifier becomes more difficult for an attacker to hijack, decrypt, and use before the session has expired.

Transport Layer Security (TLS) is a required transmission protocol for a web server hosting controlled information. The use of TLS provides confidentiality of data in transit between the web server and client. FIPS 140-2-approved TLS versions must be enabled and non-FIPS-approved SSL versions must be disabled. NIST SP 800-52 defines the approved TLS versions for government applications.

Several vulnerabilities are associated with older versions of web server software. As hot fixes and patches are issued, these solutions are included in the next version of the server software. Maintaining the web server at a current version makes the efforts of a malicious user more difficult.

Some Component Object Model (COM) components are not required for most applications and should be removed if possible. Most notably, consider disabling the File System Object component; however, this will also remove the Dictionary object. Be aware some programs may require this component (e.g., Commerce Server), so it is highly recommended this be tested completely before implementing on the production web server.

By allowing unspecified file extensions to execute, the web servers attack surface is significantly increased. This increased risk can be reduced by only allowing specific ISAPI extensions or CGI extensions to run on the web server.

Authorization rules can be configured at the server, website, folder (including Virtual Directories), or file level. It is recommended that URL Authorization be configured to only grant access to the necessary security principals. Configuring a global Authorization rule that restricts access ensures inheritance of the settings down through the hierarchy of web directories. This will ensure access to current and future content is only granted to the appropriate principals, mitigating risk of unauthorized access.