This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by Hassam Fathe Muhammad
This was my second attempt at finding areas I needed to practice in, specifically related to cybersecurity skills — particularly Vulnerability Remediation.
Before I get into how I strengthened the access control, I want to first explain the method I used to exploit a vulnerability in one of my own web apps.
My Experiment (Ethical Practice)
I acted exactly as a hacker would to try and gain access to certain services of my web app.
Important: Before proceeding further and sharing my experimental experience — please never apply such knowledge to someone else’s projects, web apps, or services without proper consent. Always do this only for learning and exploring vulnerabilities in your own environment.
How I Exploited My Own App
Targeting Admin Routes I went to the admin routes (pages) of the targeted web app and opened the Network tab in Chrome DevTools. From there, I examined the requests — pages, scripts, and other files — and was able to understand the JavaScript logic used to call APIs like updateData and savePortfolioData.
Identifying Admin-Level APIs You can usually guess admin-level API functions by inspecting the client side:
Payload Analysis I captured the payloads received from client-side APIs to see what data was coming in. After slightly modifying this data, I tested it in Postman.
Executing the Exploit By changing the payload structure, I was able to get a 200 OK response after updating the data. âś… Result: I had gained access to admin-level functions/panel on my own app.
A Surprising Finding: CORS Didn’t Interfere
I was a little surprised that CORS didn’t block me at all. After researching, I found that CORS is enforced in browsers, whereas tools like Postman or local requests bypass browser restrictions — making such API calls less likely to be blocked for attackers.
The Root Cause
If you haven’t implemented middlewares like:
Token verification (checkToken)
Role verification (checkRoles)
…then your API routes can be abused by any regular user, customer, or even a random visitor.
The Fix (My Cybersecurity Patch)
In my remediation process, I ensured that:
All role-specific routes require both token validation and role validation.
Only authorized roles can access admin functions.
By doing this, I prevented normal/non-admin users from exploiting those API routes.
Key Takeaway
Broken Access Control is one of the most critical vulnerabilities in web apps. Even if your front-end hides admin options, your APIs must be secured with proper authentication and authorization — otherwise, it’s just a matter of time before someone finds and abuses them.
Final Thoughts
This was a valuable learning experience for me — not only did I strengthen my app’s security, but I also sharpened my vulnerability remediation skills by patching a flaw I had personally exploited in a safe environment.
🛡 My Tip for Developers:
Always secure your APIs as if your front-end doesn’t exist. If your backend can’t trust the request source, it shouldn’t execute sensitive actions.
This content originally appeared on DEV Community and was authored by Hassam Fathe Muhammad
Hassam Fathe Muhammad | Sciencx (2025-10-11T18:13:21+00:00) 🔒 Vulnerability Remediation (Cybersecurity Patch) 🛠️ by Avoiding Broken Access Control 🚫. Retrieved from https://www.scien.cx/2025/10/11/%f0%9f%94%92-vulnerability-remediation-cybersecurity-patch-%f0%9f%9b%a0%ef%b8%8f-by-avoiding-broken-access-control-%f0%9f%9a%ab/
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