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RUSTSEC-2023-0073

HighCVSS 7.5 / 10
Published Dec 8, 2023·Last modified Dec 9, 2023
Affected Components(0)

No affected components available

Description

The Candid library causes a Denial of Service while parsing a specially crafted payload with empty data type. For example, if the payload is record { * ; empty } and the canister interface expects record { * } then the rust candid decoder treats empty as an extra field required by the type. The problem with type empty is that the candid rust library wrongly categorizes empty as a recoverable error when skipping the field and thus causing an infinite decoding loop.

Canisters using affected versions of candid are exposed to denial of service by causing the decoding to run indefinitely until the canister traps due to reaching maximum instruction limit per execution round. Repeated exposure to the payload will result in degraded performance of the canister.

For asset canister users, dfx versions >= 0.14.4 to <= 0.15.2-beta.0 ships asset canister with an affected version of candid.

Unaffected

  • Rust canisters using candid < 0.9.0 or >= 0.9.10
  • Rust canister interfaces of type other than record { * }
  • Motoko based canisters
  • dfx (for asset canister) <= 0.14.3 or >= 0.15.2

References

Risk Scores
Base Score
7.5

The vulnerability can be exploited over the network without needing physical access. It is easy for an attacker to exploit this vulnerability. An attacker does not need any special privileges or access rights. No user interaction is needed for the attacker to exploit this vulnerability. The impact is confined to the system where the vulnerability exists. There is a high impact on the availability of the system.

Threat Intelligence
6.9

Exploitation attempts have been detected. Elevated vigilance and prompt remediation are advised.

EPSS
N/A

Probability that this vulnerability will be exploited in the wild within the next 30 days.

Exploit
Not available

We did not find any exploit available. Neither in GitHub repositories nor in the Exploit-Database.

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High severity
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