CA3007: Review code for open redirect vulnerabilities

Property Value
Rule ID CA3007
Title Review code for open redirect vulnerabilities
Category Security
Fix is breaking or non-breaking Non-breaking
Enabled by default in .NET 8 No

Cause

Potentially untrusted HTTP request input reaches an HTTP response redirect.

By default, this rule analyzes the entire codebase, but this is configurable.

Rule description

When working with untrusted input, be mindful of open redirect vulnerabilities. An attacker can exploit an open redirect vulnerability to use your website to give the appearance of a legitimate URL, but redirect an unsuspecting visitor to a phishing or other malicious webpage.

This rule attempts to find input from HTTP requests reaching an HTTP redirect URL.

Note

This rule can't track data across assemblies. For example, if one assembly reads the HTTP request input and then passes it to another assembly that responds with an HTTP redirect, this rule won't produce a warning.

Note

There is a configurable limit to how deep this rule will analyze data flow across method calls. See Analyzer Configuration for how to configure the limit in an EditorConfig file.

How to fix violations

Some approaches to fixing open redirect vulnerabilities include:

  • Don't allow users to initiate redirects.
  • Don't allow users to specify any part of the URL in a redirect scenario.
  • Restrict redirects to a predefined "allow list" of URLs.
  • Validate redirect URLs.
  • If applicable, consider using a disclaimer page when users are being redirected away from your site.

When to suppress warnings

If you know you've validated the input to be restricted to intended URLs, it's okay to suppress this warning.

Suppress a warning

If you just want to suppress a single violation, add preprocessor directives to your source file to disable and then re-enable the rule.

#pragma warning disable CA3007
// The code that's violating the rule is on this line.
#pragma warning restore CA3007

To disable the rule for a file, folder, or project, set its severity to none in the configuration file.

[*.{cs,vb}]
dotnet_diagnostic.CA3007.severity = none

For more information, see How to suppress code analysis warnings.

Configure code to analyze

Use the following options to configure which parts of your codebase to run this rule on.

You can configure these options for just this rule, for all rules it applies to, or for all rules in this category (Security) that it applies to. For more information, see Code quality rule configuration options.

Exclude specific symbols

You can exclude specific symbols, such as types and methods, from analysis. For example, to specify that the rule should not run on any code within types named MyType, add the following key-value pair to an .editorconfig file in your project:

dotnet_code_quality.CAXXXX.excluded_symbol_names = MyType

Allowed symbol name formats in the option value (separated by |):

  • Symbol name only (includes all symbols with the name, regardless of the containing type or namespace).
  • Fully qualified names in the symbol's documentation ID format. Each symbol name requires a symbol-kind prefix, such as M: for methods, T: for types, and N: for namespaces.
  • .ctor for constructors and .cctor for static constructors.

Examples:

Option Value Summary
dotnet_code_quality.CAXXXX.excluded_symbol_names = MyType Matches all symbols named MyType.
dotnet_code_quality.CAXXXX.excluded_symbol_names = MyType1|MyType2 Matches all symbols named either MyType1 or MyType2.
dotnet_code_quality.CAXXXX.excluded_symbol_names = M:NS.MyType.MyMethod(ParamType) Matches specific method MyMethod with the specified fully qualified signature.
dotnet_code_quality.CAXXXX.excluded_symbol_names = M:NS1.MyType1.MyMethod1(ParamType)|M:NS2.MyType2.MyMethod2(ParamType) Matches specific methods MyMethod1 and MyMethod2 with the respective fully qualified signatures.

Exclude specific types and their derived types

You can exclude specific types and their derived types from analysis. For example, to specify that the rule should not run on any methods within types named MyType and their derived types, add the following key-value pair to an .editorconfig file in your project:

dotnet_code_quality.CAXXXX.excluded_type_names_with_derived_types = MyType

Allowed symbol name formats in the option value (separated by |):

  • Type name only (includes all types with the name, regardless of the containing type or namespace).
  • Fully qualified names in the symbol's documentation ID format, with an optional T: prefix.

Examples:

Option Value Summary
dotnet_code_quality.CAXXXX.excluded_type_names_with_derived_types = MyType Matches all types named MyType and all of their derived types.
dotnet_code_quality.CAXXXX.excluded_type_names_with_derived_types = MyType1|MyType2 Matches all types named either MyType1 or MyType2 and all of their derived types.
dotnet_code_quality.CAXXXX.excluded_type_names_with_derived_types = M:NS.MyType Matches specific type MyType with given fully qualified name and all of its derived types.
dotnet_code_quality.CAXXXX.excluded_type_names_with_derived_types = M:NS1.MyType1|M:NS2.MyType2 Matches specific types MyType1 and MyType2 with the respective fully qualified names, and all of their derived types.

Pseudo-code examples

Violation

using System;

public partial class WebForm : System.Web.UI.Page
{
    protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        string input = Request.Form["url"];
        this.Response.Redirect(input);
    }
}
Imports System

Partial Public Class WebForm
    Inherits System.Web.UI.Page

    Protected Sub Page_Load(sender As Object, eventArgs As EventArgs)
        Dim input As String = Me.Request.Form("url")
        Me.Response.Redirect(input)
    End Sub
End Class

Solution

using System;

public partial class WebForm : System.Web.UI.Page
{
    protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        string input = Request.Form["in"];
        if (String.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(input))
        {
            this.Response.Redirect("https://example.org/login.html");
        }
    }
}
Imports System

Partial Public Class WebForm
    Inherits System.Web.UI.Page

    Protected Sub Page_Load(sender As Object, eventArgs As EventArgs)
        Dim input As String = Me.Request.Form("in")
        If String.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(input) Then
            Me.Response.Redirect("https://example.org/login.html")
        End If
    End Sub
End Class