Understanding OWASP Top 10:2025 - What Changed

The OWASP Top 10 is the most widely recognized standard for web application security risks. The 2025 update brings important shifts in how we categorize and prioritize threats.

What Stayed the Same

A01: Broken Access Control remains the number one risk. This category covers failures in enforcing authorization - users accessing resources they shouldn't, IDOR vulnerabilities, missing function-level access controls, and CORS misconfigurations.

A02: Cryptographic Failures (formerly Sensitive Data Exposure) continues to be critical. This includes weak TLS configurations, unencrypted data in transit, and improper certificate validation.

A03: Injection remains a top concern, now encompassing SQL injection, XSS, command injection, and LDAP injection under one umbrella.

Key Changes

A04: Insecure Design emphasizes the importance of threat modeling and secure design patterns before code is written. This is a shift from purely implementation-focused risks to architectural ones.

A06: Vulnerable and Outdated Components has grown in importance as software supply chain attacks have surged. Running outdated libraries with known CVEs is one of the most common attack vectors we detect in our scans.

A08: Software and Data Integrity Failures now explicitly covers CI/CD pipeline security and software supply chain integrity - reflecting real-world attacks like SolarWinds and Codecov.

What This Means for You

If you're running a web application, the 2025 update reinforces that security is not just about patching code - it's about secure architecture, supply chain hygiene, and continuous monitoring. A comprehensive vulnerability scan maps your exposure against all 10 categories, giving you a clear picture of where to focus your security investment.

Our scanning service maps every finding to the relevant OWASP Top 10:2025 category, so you can prioritize remediation based on the most current industry standards.