6 Best Free and Open Source Web Application Firewalls
A web application firewall (WAF) is a type of application firewall that lets you see and analyze HTTP traffic to and from a web application. It has the objective of preventing attacks that seek to deny service and steal data. It gives the administrator direct control over the requests and the responses passing through the system without needing to modify backend code. A WAF differs from a standard firewall by protecting a specific web application or set of web applications. And it does this without actually touching web applications.
Unprotected web applications are the easiest entry point for criminals and vulnerable to a number of attack types. Once a web application security vulnerability is discovered, it must be promptly fixed. Virtual patching using a WAF or patching the web application code directly are two solutions. Preventing attacks in application code can be difficult and may need painstaking maintenance, patching and monitoring at multiple layers of the application topology. And web application attacks are the main cause of data breaches. About 75% of all attacks are focused at the web application level. Most websites suffer dozens of attacks every day and some popular sites suffer, on average, a thousand attacks per hour. WAFs are deployed to add an external security layer; this improves a system’s security. They detect and prevent attacks before they reach web applications.