ASP.NET Core MVC Interview Question #180

How would you secure an MVC Admin area?

Senior Practical MVC Scenarios & Production Architecture Senior Advanced

Quick Interview Answer

Protect the Admin area with server-side authorization policies or roles, not only navigation visibility or an /Admin URL. Apply authorization broadly at the area controller level or through conventions, then add more restrictive policies to sensitive operations.

Detailed Explanation

Protect the Admin area with server-side authorization policies or roles, not only navigation visibility or an /Admin URL. Apply authorization broadly at the area controller level or through conventions, then add more restrictive policies to sensitive operations.

Also use anti-forgery validation for browser-based state changes, strong authentication, least-privilege permissions, audit logging where appropriate, and secure production configuration.

Code Example

[Area("Admin")]
[Authorize(Policy = "AdminAccess")]
public class UsersController : Controller
{
    [HttpPost]
    [ValidateAntiForgeryToken]
    public IActionResult Disable(string id)
    {
        return RedirectToAction(nameof(Index));
    }
}