Authorization Tool for Usersand Media Archives in WordPress : A Role Based Authorization Plugin

Abstract: Access control is the central element of computer security and its principal objectives are to implement secure authentication and authorization in a system. Authentication is the verification that the credentials of a user are valid and authorization is the granting of permissions to a user to access system resources. This thesis describes the design and implementation of an authorization plugin, calledFile Authorization Manager, for WordPress built upon an already existing authentication plugin, called privateContent. Due to various factors mentioned in the thesis the implementation of said authorization plugin is, in its current state, not feature complete and therefore not working as intended. Due to these factors this thesis not only describes the design and implementation of an authorization plugin, but also the intricacies with developing plugins that alter the core functions of WordPress.