SameSite cookies

Recently, while reading through the updated 2017 OWASP Top Ten RC1 documentation, last updated in 2013, I noticed a recommendation to use Cookies with the “SameSite=strict” value set to reduce CSRF exposure in section A8.

Consider using the “SameSite=strict” flag on all cookies, which is increasingly supported in browsers.

Similar to the way that HttpOnly and Secure attributes have been added, SameSite allows for additional control.

Per the documentation, as of April 2017 the SameSite attribute is implemented in Chrome 51 and Opera 39. Firefox has an open defect, but I would expect it to be added soon to follow Chrome.


Set-Cookie: CookieName=CookieValue; SameSite=Lax;
Set-Cookie: CookieName=CookieValue; SameSite=Strict;

According to the specification you can issue the SameSite flag without a value and Strict will be assumed:


Set-Cookie: CookieName=CookieValue; SameSite

As many programming languages and server runtime environments do not yet support this for session cookies, you can use the Apache Tier1 configuration to append them.


Header edit Set-Cookie ^(JSESSIONID.*)$ $1;SameSite=Strict
Header edit Set-Cookie ^(PHPSESSID.*)$ $1;SameSite=Strict

It looks like PHP.INI might support the following attribute in a future release, but it’s not there yet!

session.cookie_samesite

REFERENCES:

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