Incorrect Privilege Assignment

Draft Base

Structure: Simple

Description

A product incorrectly assigns a privilege to a particular actor, creating an unintended sphere of control for that actor.

Common Consequences 1

Scope: Access Control

Impact: Gain Privileges or Assume Identity

A user can access restricted functionality and/or sensitive information that may include administrative functionality and user accounts.

Potential Mitigations 2

Phase: Architecture and DesignOperation

Very carefully manage the setting, management, and handling of privileges. Explicitly manage trust zones in the software.

Phase: Architecture and DesignOperation

Strategy: Environment Hardening

Run your code using the lowest privileges that are required to accomplish the necessary tasks [REF-76]. If possible, create isolated accounts with limited privileges that are only used for a single task. That way, a successful attack will not immediately give the attacker access to the rest of the software or its environment. For example, database applications rarely need to run as the database administrator, especially in day-to-day operations.

Demonstrative Examples 3

ID : DX-97

The following example demonstrates the weakness.

Code Example:

Bad

/* do some stuff /

ID : DX-142

The following example demonstrates the weakness.

Code Example:

Bad

Java

java

// privileged code goes here, for example:* System.loadLibrary("awt"); return null;

java

ID : DX-108

This application sends a special intent with a flag that allows the receiving application to read a data file for backup purposes.

Code Example:Bad
Java
java

Code Example:Attack
Java
java

Any malicious application can register to receive this intent. Because of the FLAG_GRANT_READ_URI_PERMISSION included with the intent, the malicious receiver code can read the user's data.

Observed Examples 4

CVE-1999-1193untrusted user placed in unix "wheel" group

CVE-2005-2741Product allows users to grant themselves certain rights that can be used to escalate privileges.

CVE-2005-2496Product uses group ID of a user instead of the group, causing it to run with different privileges. This is resultant from some other unknown issue.

CVE-2004-0274Product mistakenly assigns a particular status to an entity, leading to increased privileges.

References 1

Least Privilege

Sean Barnum and Michael Gegick

14-09-2005

https://web.archive.org/web/20211209014121/https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/bsi/articles/knowledge/principles/least-privilege(2023-04-07)

ID: REF-76

Applicable Platforms

Languages:

Not Language-Specific : Undetermined

Modes of Introduction

Implementation

Affected Resources

System Process

Related Weaknesses

ChildOf:

Improper Privilege Management (CWE-269)

CanAlsoBe:

Incorrect User Management (CWE-286)

Taxonomy Mapping

PLOVER
The CERT Oracle Secure Coding Standard for Java (2011)
The CERT Oracle Secure Coding Standard for Java (2011)