Chapter 32. Hiding PHP

In general, security by obscurity is one of the weakest forms of security. But in some cases, every little bit of extra security is desirable.

A few simple techniques can help to hide PHP, possibly slowing down an attacker who is attempting to discover weaknesses in your system. By setting expose_php = off in your php.ini file, you reduce the amount of information available to them.

Another tactic is to configure web servers such as apache to parse different filetypes through PHP, either with an .htaccess directive, or in the apache configuration file itself. You can then use misleading file extensions:

# Make PHP code look like other code types
AddType application/x-httpd-php .asp .py .pl

# Make PHP code look like unknown types
AddType application/x-httpd-php .bop .foo .133t

# Make all PHP code look like HTML
AddType application/x-httpd-php .htm .html