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Generate Content Security Policy

Use this page when the goal is CSP creation: turning your known vendors and resource dependencies into a deployable browser policy.

Use this guide to understand the issue, validate the problem manually, and run the live scanner when you are ready. Get results in under 30 seconds.

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Why teams search for this check

Search intent around this topic usually comes from one of three pressures: a buyer or procurement questionnaire, a legal or compliance review, or an engineering team trying to validate a risky browser behavior before launch.

This page is written to answer that intent directly, without generic filler. It explains what the issue means technically, how to confirm it manually, and what a defensible fix looks like in production.

What this means

A Content Security Policy (CSP) is a foundational HTTP response header that serves as a whitelist for the resources the browser is permitted to load on a specific page.

Instead of blindly trusting that all scripts and styles are safe, a CSP strictly tells the browser, 'Only execute JavaScript that originates from these specific, trusted domains.' If an attacker manages to inject malicious code into a forum comment or via a compromised third-party widget, the browser will refuse to run it because the attacker's domain is not on the whitelist.

Why it matters

Building a strict CSP is the single most effective way to eliminate Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities, a class of attacks that consistently ranks in the OWASP Top 10 web security risks. In practice, teams usually do not lose trust because of a single configuration detail. They lose trust when the issue suggests weak governance, undocumented vendors, avoidable data sharing, or a disconnect between legal claims and live technical behavior.

What this tool specifically detects

  • Whether your current asset model needs a restrictive Content-Security-Policy rather than open-ended script loading.
  • The resource categories that usually need explicit allowlisting, including scripts, styles, fonts, frames, and connections.
  • Common CSP design mistakes such as relying on unsafe-inline or allowing broad wildcard sources.

When this becomes critical

  • You process forms, account actions, payments, or embedded third-party content.
  • You need demonstrable XSS mitigation for customer trust or procurement reviews.
  • Your application is growing and script governance is becoming harder to manage manually.

How this check works

Our free interactive builder helps you generate a Content Security Policy by allowing you to define your permitted sources for scripts, styles, images, frames, and fonts, instantly generating the correct HTTP header syntax to copy and paste.

The goal is not to create noise. The goal is to surface the signal that matters first, show you how the issue normally appears in production, and help you decide whether you need a quick fix, a deeper audit, or a broader policy update.

Real-world examples that trigger this finding

A marketing widget injects inline JavaScript, so the team keeps unsafe-inline permanently and weakens the policy.

An analytics change adds a new connect-src endpoint and silently breaks data collection in production.

A site uses third-party checkout or chat tools without modeling their frame-src or script-src requirements.

How to manually detect this issue

  • List every external script, style, font, image, frame, and API endpoint used by the page.
  • Open the browser console and review CSP violations after enabling report-only mode.
  • Inspect inline scripts and event handlers that would need nonces or hashes instead of unsafe-inline.

How to fix it

  • Start from a default-src none or tight default and explicitly allow only required sources.
  • Replace unsafe-inline with nonces or hashes where possible.
  • Use report-only mode first, then promote the policy after reviewing violations and business-critical flows.

Common mistakes teams make

  • Copying a generic CSP example from another stack.
  • Allowing entire vendor domains when only one endpoint is needed.
  • Forgetting to update CSP after marketing or product teams add a new dependency.

Internal links for this topic

Use the hub page for the full topic map, then jump into the most relevant tools, guides, and related checks from the same cluster.

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Frequently Asked Questions

What do I need before generating a CSP?+
You need a clear list of the scripts, APIs, fonts, frames, and third-party services your page genuinely needs. A CSP is only as good as your dependency inventory.
Why is report-only mode useful during CSP generation?+
It lets you see what would break before enforcement, which is especially helpful when marketing tags or third-party widgets were added without full documentation.
Where should the generated CSP be deployed?+
The strongest option is usually an HTTP response header at the server, framework, or CDN layer so the browser receives the policy consistently on every relevant response.

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