Why Don't Developers Detect Improper Input Validation?'; DROP TABLE Papers; --
This addresses a critical security problem for software developers, though it is incremental in understanding detection barriers.
The study investigated why developers often fail to detect Improper Input Validation vulnerabilities, finding that visible attack scenarios improve detection, but 60 out of 146 participants still could not identify the vulnerability even after warnings.
Improper Input Validation (IIV) is a software vulnerability that occurs when a system does not safely handle input data. Even though IIV is easy to detect and fix, it still commonly happens in practice. In this paper, we study to what extent developers can detect IIV and investigate underlying reasons. This knowledge is essential to better understand how to support developers in creating secure software systems. We conduct an online experiment with 146 participants, of which 105 report at least three years of professional software development experience. Our results show that the existence of a visible attack scenario facilitates the detection of IIV vulnerabilities and that a significant portion of developers who did not find the vulnerability initially could identify it when warned about its existence. Yet, a total of 60 participants could not detect the vulnerability even after the warning. Other factors, such as the frequency with which the participants perform code reviews, influence the detection of IIV. Data and materials: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3996696