CAPEC-14

Detailed Abstraction Level
Meta — Very abstract, high-level category
Standard — Specific enough to understand
Detailed — Tied to specific technique Draft MITRE CAPEC Status
Stable — Fully reviewed and complete
Draft — Under development
Incomplete — Partially defined
Deprecated — No longer recommended
Obsolete — Replaced by another CAPEC Likelihood: Medium Severity: High
Client-side Injection-induced Buffer Overflow

Description

This type of attack exploits a buffer overflow vulnerability in targeted client software through injection of malicious content from a custom-built hostile service. This hostile service is created to deliver the correct content to the client software. For example, if the client-side application is a browser, the service will host a webpage that the browser loads.

Prerequisites

The targeted client software communicates with an external server.

The targeted client software has a buffer overflow vulnerability.

Mitigations

The client software should not install untrusted code from a non-authenticated server.

The client software should have the latest patches and should be audited for vulnerabilities before being used to communicate with potentially hostile servers.

Perform input validation for length of buffer inputs.

Use a language or compiler that performs automatic bounds checking.

Use an abstraction library to abstract away risky APIs. Not a complete solution.

Compiler-based canary mechanisms such as StackGuard, ProPolice and the Microsoft Visual Studio /GS flag. Unless this provides automatic bounds checking, it is not a complete solution.

Ensure all buffer uses are consistently bounds-checked.

Use OS-level preventative functionality. Not a complete solution.

Skills Required

[Low] To achieve a denial of service, an attacker can simply overflow a buffer by inserting a long string into an attacker-modifiable injection vector.

[High] Exploiting a buffer overflow to inject malicious code into the stack of a software system or even the heap requires a more in-depth knowledge and higher skill level.