Automated Web Application Discovery for Reverse Proxy Integration
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Solution Overview
Problem
The process of integrating web-based applications with a web portal is challenging due to the need for manual discovery of application characteristics by security professionals and business application owners, requiring significant time and effort, especially when dealing with thousands of applications using different technologies.
Innovation Solution
An automated process using an application discovery engine that examines network traffic and performs deep packet analysis to identify application characteristics, utilizing monitoring and scanning tools, and heuristic-based rules to generate configuration data for seamless integration with a reverse proxy.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If manual discovery and integration processes are used, then security professionals can identify application characteristics, but the time and effort required increases significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The application itself provides the necessary characteristic information through automated probing and interaction. The system sends test requests to the application and analyzes the responses to automatically discover authentication methods, session management, and other security characteristics without requiring manual intervention from security professionals.
Solution Approach 2:
Manual mechanical processes of security professionals examining applications are replaced with automated electronic probing and analysis systems. The system uses scripted interactions, network traffic analysis, and pattern recognition to automatically detect application characteristics that would otherwise require manual security assessment.
2Measurement precision
If expert security professionals perform integration, then accurate application characteristics are obtained, but the complexity and resource requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The integration system is designed to handle multiple types of applications with different technologies (Java, .NET, PHP, etc.) using a single universal probing and analysis platform. The system automatically adapts to various application types by detecting their characteristics and applying appropriate integration methods, eliminating the need for separate expert processes for each application type.
Solution Approach 2:
An automated intermediary system is introduced between the security professionals and the applications. This intermediary automatically performs the characteristic discovery and integration tasks, translating application responses into configuration data for the reverse proxy without requiring direct human involvement in the technical integration process.
3Reliability
If comprehensive application monitoring is performed, then complete configuration data is obtained, but the resources and time required increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs monitoring and probing to the extent necessary to obtain the minimum complete set of configuration data required for reverse proxy integration. Rather than exhaustively analyzing every possible application characteristic, the system focuses on detecting the specific attributes needed for security integration, such as authentication methods and session management, thereby achieving sufficient completeness without excessive resource consumption.
Data Source
AI summary
This disclosure describes an automated process of discovering characteristics needed to integrate a web-based application to a web portal, such as a reverse proxy. This process eliminates the need for application owners and security analysts to manually discover the information needed for the on-boarding process. To this end, application-specific information is determined by monitoring network traffic flows in and out of the application, user authentication and authorization event data, and the like. An application discovery engine analyzes the discovered data, preferably against a set of patterns and heuristic-based rules, to discover or identify the one or more application characteristics. A set of configuration data is then generated, and this configuration data is then used to integrate the application into the web reverse proxy and, in particular, by specifying the configuration needed to “board” the application. Preferably, the monitoring and application characterization determination functions occur in an automated manner.