DVWA can also be used as a reference to secure coding, if a developer is not quite sure if they have protected their application against XSS for example, they can view DVWAs source code as a reference. There is plenty of information within DVWA to help the beginner get started.It can be used as just a learning aid, DVWA is designed as such to be as easy as possible to set up and use.It can be used to teach web application security by showing practical examples and setting challenges for the students.In order to identify the vulnerabilities in a web application, you must be attacking a vulnerable system. The low setting mimics a vulnerable web application, while the high setting mimics a secure web application. The below screen is the output, when you click on “ Create/Reset Database” button.Īnd last, set your security level to “ low“, “ medium“, “ high” or “b”. When everything goes right, simply click on “ Create/Reset Database” which automatically installs DVWA application. You also need to do a last change in php.ini file (located at /etc/php/7.2/apache2/php.ini) with the following changes:Īnd at the end, Start your apache server by typing “ service apache2 start”Īccess your local machine IP in your browser ( ) and login with default credentials which are:Īfter that, you can see that it satisfies all the conditions which DVWA needs. Next, the mandatory thing to run DVWA is a PHP-GD module which is necessary for this application and can be installed via apt-get install php-gd.

In this step, you need to run a couple of commands for creating a database and user.īefore to login into MySQL console, make sure that your MySQL service must be started ( service mysql start)Īnd then run the following commands inside MySQL console which creates a new database named as dvwa and user with password pass:Ĭommand: CREATE USER IDENTIFIED BY ‘pass’ Ĭommand: GRANT ALL ON dvwa.* TO FLUSH PRIVILEGES įurthermore, you need to edit your DVWA configuration file (located at /config/) and edit the details as per below screenshot. Next, you need to rename the DVWA’s configuration file located at /config directory from to as shown below:Ĭommand: mv Īnd give 777 permissions to main DVWA directory by typing “ chmod -R 777 DVWA/” Note: Make sure that, you must download the above package of DVWA inside /var/www/html directory. Github by typing the following command in your terminal: The first step is to download the source code of DVWA application from one of the best open source repository database i.e. There is also more Vulnerable machine available like bWAPP, Mutillidae, Metasplotiable you can also try these. PHP-IDS is used in DVWA to serve as a live example of how WAFs can help improve security in web applications and in some cases how WAFs can be circumvented. PHP-IDS works by filtering any user supplied input against a blacklist of potentially malicious code. PHP-IDS is a popular PHP Intrusion Detection System (IDS) also known as a Web Application Firewall (WAF). By default when DVWA is loaded the security level is set to Impossible. Each level changes the vulnerability state of DVWA throughout the application. The security levels are named low, medium, high and impossible. DVWAs Security features can be divided into two parts, one is the security levels and the other is PHP-IDS. In fact, this is running in your local environment and it is totally legal.Īs well as being vulnerable, DVWA has some other features which aid in the teaching or learning of web application security.

In DVWA you do not have to take permission from others, you can simply install this in a virtual environment and start using it.

For advanced users to sharpen their skill DVWA is the best platform. So as a student or beginners from where you got this permission so you can use this.

Hacking anything without the permission is a Crime.

Its main goals are to be an aid for security professionals to test their skills and tools in a legal environment, help web developers better understand the processes of securing web applications and aid teachers/students to teach/learn web application security in a class room environment. Damn Vulnerable Web App (DVWA) is a PHP/MySQL web application that is damn defenseless.

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