OWASP Top 10 for Modern Applications
How to use the OWASP Top 10 as a starting point for practical application security testing.
The OWASP Top 10 is a useful risk-awareness baseline, but an assessment should go beyond checking a list. Test the application's architecture, trust boundaries, authentication flows, authorization model, business logic and exposed attack surface.
What to review
Authentication & identity
Review login flows, session handling, password controls, MFA enforcement and recovery mechanisms.
Authorization
Test horizontal and vertical privilege boundaries using controlled account and role comparisons.
Input & output handling
Assess injection paths, unsafe parsing, file handling, output encoding and server-side processing.
Configuration
Check security headers, exposed services, debug features, error handling and deployment defaults.
Practical testing approach
- Map the application's attack surface and trust boundaries.
- Identify high-value functions and sensitive data flows.
- Validate suspected weaknesses manually rather than relying only on scanners.
- Capture reproducible evidence and explain business impact.
- Provide remediation guidance and retest after fixes.
Need this applied to your environment?
R53SEC can scope a web application or API security assessment around your actual attack surface.