WebApp Sec mailing list archives

RE: Is logoff feature necessary


From: "Auri Rahimzadeh" <Auri () auri net>
Date: Wed, 3 May 2006 09:22:57 -0500

Keep in mind that from what I've seen simply closing ONE browser window when more than one is open doesn't 
automatically clear/invalidate the session. Both IE and Firefox generally keep those cookies around until ALL windows 
have been closed. This happens a lot in an application I'm working on now - users complain the wrong data is coming up, 
and they think closing that one window will fix things. Nope - they have to close all of them. It usually turns into a 
"well, I rebooted and it worked", when all that did was close all their windows. This would be an interesting issue 
should some adware/malware keep a window open off-screen, or where the user didn't see it. I'd be interested to know if 
there's a trick to force the cookie to be removed when you close a single window when multiple windows are open, other 
than using Javascript to do it.

Thanks again!

Best,

Auri Rahimzadeh
Author
Hacking the PSP
www.hackingpsp.com

---------- Original Message ----------------------------------
From: Keith Duffin <kduffin () duffin org>
Date:  Wed, 3 May 2006 08:45:46 -0400 (EDT)

What about instances where an identity framework is used, such as CA's
Siteminder or IBM's Identity Mangament Suite?  Closing the browser will
result in the session begin invalidated - I'm not sure if that cascades to
releasing other resources or not.

On Wed, 3 May 2006, Auri Rahimzadeh wrote:

In addition, having the session state continues to reserves those resources
on the server. So, if there were open recordsets in memory (bad developer!),
(truncated)


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