Responsible Disclosure

Informational

Definition

Responsible Disclosure is the ethical process of reporting security vulnerabilities to the vendor or owner of the affected software, giving them a reasonable window to fix the problem before making it public. In bug bounty, this concept is formalized through programs with clear disclosure rules, response times and Safe Harbor policies.

Impact

Protects users while the patch is being developedBuilds trust between researchers and companiesProvides legal protection to the researcher (Safe Harbor)Enables orderly remediation without exposing usersThe ethical foundation of the entire bug bounty industry

Examples

Typical Responsible Disclosure process

1) The researcher discovers the vulnerability. 2) Reports it to the vendor or via a bug bounty platform. 3) The vendor confirms it and works on the patch (typically a 90-day window). 4) The patch is released. 5) After an additional period, the researcher may publish the technical details. On platforms like HackerOne or Bugcrowd, this process is formalized with SLAs and safe-harbor policies.

External references

OWASP - Vulnerability Disclosure

Related terms

Bug Bounty

CVE

Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures

CVSS

Common Vulnerability Scoring System

HackerOne

Bugcrowd

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