[nupark]

It is not unreasonable to assert that SQLI defense is a framework concern, not a database issue.

The database is the normative reference on what is and is not a special cased character and how escaping should be implemented. I don't think it's reasonable to assert that escaping is a concern that should be adopted by every framework that might ever talk to a database.

The examples you've provided of Rails SQLI issues are bad ones

I'm sure you could supply some better examples since your focus is in security, and there are a vast number of issues that have arisen in ActiveRecord's escaping (especially in early versions of Rails). These are merely what I quickly found while Googling.

The first is a discussion of SQLI in an interface designed to accept raw SQL; it's the ActiveRecord "back door" interface.

It's also an interface that was repeatedly and unintentionally used by Rails users to insert unescaped queries in a way that did not immediately appear incorrect, as evidenced by the preponderance of questions on the subject.

The second is a discussion of SQLI in a context where parameterized queries don't work anyways (the MySQL protocol doesn't accept LIMIT and OFFSET arguments as anything but integer constants); it is also the simplest of the class of SQLI concern areas (you can solve it by blindly calling #to_i on your inputs), which also includes table names, sort orders, and column references.

Given that this conversation is occurring in the context of discussing how MySQL's design has led to exactly these types of errors, I think this is an applicable example.

[tptacek]

A "vast number of issues"? Huh? Citation needed.

I don't know how to respond to any of these points.

The discussion at hand is, "who's job is it to defend against SQLI, the database, the framework, or the application?".

Of those three components, the database is least well equipped to defend against SQLI. SQLI is "avenue for attacker to submit queries to a database contrary to the intentions of the application". The database's simple job is to accept and execute queries.

[nupark]

A "vast number of issues"? Huh? Citation needed.

The last time I researched this, I started here:

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8&#3...

... would up and sources like this:

http://lists.rubyonrails.org/pipermail/rails/2004-December/0...

... and spent a good hour reading the Rails source code. My take away was that, historically, a lack of care coupled with a lack of use of the parameterized APIs left the door open to repeated failures in the implementation to protect against SQL injection.

Things have improved in Rails, but as a historical example of the pitfalls of ignoring/eschewing parameterized query APIs, I believe it to be quite valid.

The discussion at hand is, "who's job is it to defend against SQLI, the database, the framework, or the application?". Of those three components, the database is least well equipped to defend against SQLI. SQLI is "avenue for attacker to submit queries to a database contrary to the intentions of the application". The database's simple job is to accept and execute queries.

No, you're reframing the discussion. The original poster commented on MySQL's longtime begrudging support for parameterized queries (or lack thereof) as one of the major causes of the prevalence of SQL injection issues.

It seems clear to me that the database -- as the central implementation responsible for parsing queries -- is the best equipped to provide safe, correct string interpolation of those queries.

[tptacek]

People that don't know Rails are going to think that you're making pointed critiques of the framework, when in fact you appear to be repeatedly citing examples of people going through extra effort to use the interfaces Rails provides for directly using SQL instead of ActiveRecord's finders.

[nupark]

I'm not offering a "pointed critique of Rails" ([edit] although your framing it as such seems to encourage downvotes into the negatives). I'm demonstrating how the use of non-parameterized queries source of error that has repeatedly resulted in SQL injection issues in ActiveRecord. I have provided three different examples:

- In the first, the API design itself made it non-obvious/easy to directly concatenate strings while -- at a glance -- appearing to be correct.

- In the second, the API's implementation resulted in SQL injection because :limit and :offset arguments were not correctly escaped.

- In the third, the API's documentation and recommended usage (in 2004) encouraged users to use constructs that appeared to provide defense against SQL injection, but in reality, did not.