Modes Of Introduction
Implementation : REALIZATION: This weakness is caused during implementation of an architectural security tactic.
Applicable Platforms
Language
Class: Not Language-Specific (Undetermined)
Common Consequences
Scope |
Impact |
Likelihood |
Other | Other, Alter Execution Logic | |
Observed Examples
Reference |
Description |
CVE-2003-0501 | Special file system allows attackers to prevent ownership/permission change of certain entries by opening the entries before calling a setuid program. |
CVE-2004-0148 | FTP server places a user in the root directory when the user's permissions prevent access to the their own home directory. |
Potential Mitigations
Phases : Architecture and Design
Compartmentalize the system to have "safe" areas where trust boundaries can be unambiguously drawn. Do not allow sensitive data to go outside of the trust boundary and always be careful when interfacing with a compartment outside of the safe area.
Ensure that appropriate compartmentalization is built into the system design, and the compartmentalization allows for and reinforces privilege separation functionality. Architects and designers should rely on the principle of least privilege to decide the appropriate time to use privileges and the time to drop privileges.
Phases : Implementation
Always check to see if you have successfully accessed a resource or system functionality, and use proper error handling if it is unsuccessful. Do this even when you are operating in a highly privileged mode, because errors or environmental conditions might still cause a failure. For example, environments with highly granular permissions/privilege models, such as Windows or Linux capabilities, can cause unexpected failures.
Vulnerability Mapping Notes
Rationale : This CWE entry is at the Base level of abstraction, which is a preferred level of abstraction for mapping to the root causes of vulnerabilities.
Comments : Carefully read both the name and description to ensure that this mapping is an appropriate fit. Do not try to 'force' a mapping to a lower-level Base/Variant simply to comply with this preferred level of abstraction.
Notes
CWE-280 and CWE-274 are too similar. It is likely that CWE-274 will be deprecated in the future.
This can be both primary and resultant. When primary, it can expose a variety of weaknesses because a resource might not have the expected state, and subsequent operations might fail. It is often resultant from Unchecked Error Condition (CWE-391).
Within the context of vulnerability theory, privileges and permissions are two sides of the same coin. Privileges are associated with actors, and permissions are associated with resources. To perform access control, at some point the software makes a decision about whether the actor (and the privileges that have been assigned to that actor) is allowed to access the resource (based on the permissions that have been specified for that resource).
This type of issue is under-studied, since researchers often concentrate on whether an object has too many permissions, instead of not enough. These weaknesses are likely to appear in environments with fine-grained models for permissions and privileges, which can include operating systems and other large-scale software packages. However, even highly simplistic permission/privilege models are likely to contain these issues if the developer has not considered the possibility of access failure.
Submission
Name |
Organization |
Date |
Date Release |
Version |
PLOVER |
|
2006-07-19 +00:00 |
2006-07-19 +00:00 |
Draft 3 |
Modifications
Name |
Organization |
Date |
Comment |
Eric Dalci |
Cigital |
2008-07-01 +00:00 |
updated Time_of_Introduction |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2008-09-08 +00:00 |
updated Maintenance_Notes, Relationships, Relationship_Notes, Taxonomy_Mappings |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2009-03-10 +00:00 |
updated Description, Name, Theoretical_Notes |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2010-02-16 +00:00 |
updated Taxonomy_Mappings |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2011-06-01 +00:00 |
updated Common_Consequences |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2012-05-11 +00:00 |
updated Relationships |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2012-10-30 +00:00 |
updated Potential_Mitigations |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2014-07-30 +00:00 |
updated Relationships, Taxonomy_Mappings |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2017-11-08 +00:00 |
updated Applicable_Platforms, Modes_of_Introduction, Observed_Examples, Relationships |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2019-06-20 +00:00 |
updated Relationships |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2020-02-24 +00:00 |
updated Relationships |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2020-12-10 +00:00 |
updated Potential_Mitigations |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2021-03-15 +00:00 |
updated Maintenance_Notes |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2021-10-28 +00:00 |
updated Relationships |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2023-01-31 +00:00 |
updated Description |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2023-04-27 +00:00 |
updated Relationships, Time_of_Introduction |
CWE Content Team |
MITRE |
2023-06-29 +00:00 |
updated Mapping_Notes |