August 2022 Summaries

Azion has introduced a new feature called Scheduled Blocking, an edge function designed to control application access based on specified time windows, thus conserving server resources by limiting access to necessary periods only. This feature, available for free in the Azion Marketplace, can be implemented through the Edge Firewall's functions section, allowing users to create a Function Instance with customized schedules for weekdays and weekends. By incorporating JSON Args, users can customize the response to provide meaningful messages or even HTML pages during blocked periods, enhancing user interaction. Additionally, geolocation-based rules can be added to restrict access only to specified countries, ensuring the application remains protected from unwanted access based on both time and location. This flexible solution is particularly useful for applications like live streaming services that require precise control over user access.

Cookie tampering attacks involve altering client-side session cookie data to facilitate unauthorized access or identity theft, occurring when web applications use unencrypted cookies to store session data. Azion's Signed Cookies solution helps prevent such attacks by using edge functions to generate and validate signed cookies, ensuring cookies are not manipulated on the client side. The process involves activating the necessary solutions on Azion's marketplace, creating instances of "Signed Cookies - Hash Generator" and "Signed Cookies - Hash Validator" functions, and integrating them into the application's Rules Engine. This integration enables the application to detect cookie manipulations, add request headers to flag violations, and execute preventive actions like denying access when violations occur, thus enhancing security against cookie tampering.