Web application security testing is an important task for businesses that run online services. It helps detect vulnerabilities that can disrupt your operations and impact customer experience, security programs and employee output.

One of the most common types of vulnerabilities is URL manipulation, where a hacker changes some information in a query string to intercept important data and credentials. This can lead to CSRF or SQL injection attacks, which can corrupt your data.

White Box Testing

White box testing enables testers to gain access to the source code of an application and to test its functionality. This helps them uncover programming and implementation errors that could compromise security.

Performing white box testing at an early stage of the development process increases productivity in both detecting and fixing bugs. It also allows developers to verify design decisions quickly, avoiding costly re-design efforts.

A white box test strategy should be developed based on risk analysis. Architectural and design-level risk analysis helps identify the major activities involved, key decisions made, challenges faced in a testing effort, and the necessary skill level of test staff.

White box tests typically use a path coverage approach to unit test as many of the paths through the program’s control flow as possible. This approach focuses on finding conditional logic that is broken, redundant, or inefficient. It also identifies logical error paths that appear frequently in software applications. It helps to uncover “unintended” features that might be hidden during implementation or omitted from the initial design.

Black Box Testing

Black box testing is a form of software testing that tests applications without knowledge of the system's inner workings. This method can help detect vulnerabilities that white box testing tools like static application security tools (SAST) may miss.

Using this technique, testers create scenarios with valid data to evaluate every possible action and option a user can take on a screen. For example, if an online banking application allows customers to enter debit transactions for $0.00, testers would write a test case that simulates the situation and see what kind of output the app gives.

Black box testing also takes into account different browsers, devices and operating systems to ensure that your system works seamlessly across them all. This prevents recurring bugs and reduces testing costs.

Grey Box Testing

Gray Box Testing is a testing technique that combines the advantages of both black box and white box testing. It is based on functional specifications rather than source code or binaries.

Grey box testing can be used to find defects in an application that you can’t easily fix with black box testing. This is because you don’t have access to the inner workings of the application, so you can’t see how it functions.

You can use grey box testing to make sure that your applications function as expected for authenticated users and prevent malicious users from accessing sensitive information or functionality. There are several techniques that you can use when performing grey box testing, and deciding which ones are right for your application depends on how you’re testing the software.

One technique you can use is matrix testing, which examines all of the variables in your application and assesses them according to their business and technical risks. This can help you uncover unused or un-optimized variables.

Traceability Matrix

Traceability matrix is a document that helps testers to map all the requirements mentioned in Business Requirements Document (BRD) to Test Cases or Test Scenarios. It also helps to check if the testing project is progressing in the expected direction.

The traceability matrix includes parameters like requirement ID, risks involved, risk type and description, unit test cases, integration test cases and user acceptance test cases. It also captures the status and bugs logged if any.

A bidirectional traceability matrix is ideal because it combines forward and backward traceability in one place. This gives teams full visibility from customer needs and requirements specifications through building, testing, changes, and defects--and back.

Creating and using this traceability matrix is important to ensure that all the necessary tests are covered. It can help to eliminate issues that are out of scope and reduce the number of test cases required for any functionality. It can also streamline the entire testing process.