The application form should run as a separate service, preferably on a separate virtual machine, mostly independent from the membership management software. For this, the latter has to expose a write-only API to the former, thus limiting attack surface dramatically. The membership management software then can run in the coop intranet with access only via VPN, for example. This separation-of-concerns approach covers best practices and the obligation to pursue the state of the art of what is technically possible.
The application form should run as a separate service, preferably on a separate virtual machine, mostly independent from the membership management software. For this, the latter has to expose a write-only API to the former, thus limiting attack surface dramatically. The membership management software then can run in the coop intranet with access only via VPN, for example. This separation-of-concerns approach covers best practices and the obligation to pursue the state of the art of what is technically possible.