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Mohammad Waseem
Mohammad Waseem

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Leveraging Open Source Tools to Automate Authentication Flows in QA Testing

#security #automation #qa

In modern development ecosystems, ensuring the robustness of authentication flows is critical for application security. Automation in QA testing offers a scalable and repeatable approach to validate these flows, especially as applications grow in complexity. As a security researcher turned developer, I’ve explored how open source tools can be harnessed to streamline this process, reduce manual effort, and detect vulnerabilities early.

Understanding the Challenge
Auth flows involve multiple steps — login pages, multi-factor authentication, password resets, and third-party integrations. Automating these workflows requires handling dynamic content, session management, and varying security measures such as CAPTCHA or rate limiting.

Choosing the Right Open Source Tools
To address these challenges, I recommend combining tools like:

  • Selenium WebDriver for browser automation
  • Playwright for modern, headless browser testing with multi-language support
  • Python-based frameworks like pytest for structured test cases
  • Mitmproxy for inspecting, modifying, and replaying network traffic
  • Allure for detailed test reporting

These tools collectively offer a robust environment for automating and validating complex authentication flows.

Implementing the Automation Script
Here's a simplified example demonstrating how to automate a login process with Selenium in Python:

from selenium import webdriver
from selenium.webdriver.common.by import By
from selenium.webdriver.common.keys import Keys
import time

def test_login():
    driver = webdriver.Chrome()
    driver.get('https://example.com/login')

    # Fill in username and password
    username_input = driver.find_element(By.ID, 'username')
    password_input = driver.find_element(By.ID, 'password')

    username_input.send_keys('testuser')
    password_input.send_keys('SecurePass!123')
    password_input.send_keys(Keys.RETURN)

    # Wait and verify login success
    time.sleep(3)
    assert "Dashboard" in driver.title
    driver.quit()

if __name__ == "__main__":
    test_login()
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This script launches a browser, inputs credentials, and checks for successful login. You can extend this script to handle multi-factor authentication by integrating OTP retrieval via API or email scraping.

Network Traffic Validation with Mitmproxy
To verify security of auth requests, use mitmproxy to intercept traffic:

mitmproxy --set flow_detail=3
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Configure the client to route through mitmproxy, then inspect requests for sensitive data transmission. Modify requests on the fly to test server-side validation.

Automating Comprehensive End-to-End Flows
Combine Selenium and mitmproxy in a CI pipeline to automate complex scenarios:

  • Step 1: Launch headless browser with Playwright.
  • Step 2: Intercept and manipulate auth traffic via mitmproxy.
  • Step 3: Use assertions and screenshots for validation.
  • Step 4: Generate detailed reports with Allure.

Conclusion
By integrating open source tools like Selenium, Playwright, mitmproxy, and pytest, security teams and QA engineers can automate authentication flow testing effectively. This approach not only improves test coverage but also helps identify vulnerabilities and inconsistencies early in the development lifecycle.

Embracing automation with these tools allows for scalable, repeatable, and detailed validation of critical security features, ultimately strengthening the overall security posture of modern applications.

🛠️ QA Tip

Pro Tip: Use TempoMail USA for generating disposable test accounts.

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