Skip to content

Latest commit

 

History

History
74 lines (61 loc) · 8.9 KB

threat-modeling.md

File metadata and controls

74 lines (61 loc) · 8.9 KB

Threat Model Analysis for apache/arrow

Threat: Buffer Overflow in C++ Core

  • Description: An attacker crafts malicious input data that, when processed by Arrow's C++ core, causes a buffer overflow. This can be achieved by sending specially crafted IPC messages or providing manipulated data to Arrow APIs.
  • Impact: Memory corruption, denial of service (application crash), potentially remote code execution if the attacker can control the overflowed data to overwrite execution flow.
  • Affected Arrow Component: Arrow C++ core, specifically schema parsing, data deserialization, and memory allocation routines within cpp/src/arrow.
  • Risk Severity: Critical
  • Mitigation Strategies:
    • Input Validation: Strictly validate input data schemas and data sizes before processing with Arrow. Implement size limits and schema complexity checks.
    • Fuzzing: Regularly fuzz Arrow C++ core with various input data, including malformed and oversized data, to identify potential buffer overflows.
    • Memory Safety Tools: Utilize memory safety tools (e.g., AddressSanitizer, MemorySanitizer) during development and testing of applications using Arrow.
    • Keep Arrow Up-to-Date: Ensure Arrow library is updated to the latest version to benefit from bug fixes and security patches.

Threat: Use-After-Free Vulnerabilities

  • Description: An attacker triggers a scenario where memory that has already been freed by Arrow C++ core is accessed again. This can be caused by race conditions in multi-threaded operations or incorrect object lifetime management within Arrow itself.
  • Impact: Memory corruption, application crash, potentially remote code execution if attacker can control freed memory and its subsequent access.
  • Affected Arrow Component: Arrow C++ core, especially in areas involving object lifecycle management, concurrency, and asynchronous operations within cpp/src/arrow/util and cpp/src/arrow/compute.
  • Risk Severity: Critical
  • Mitigation Strategies:
    • Concurrency Control: Implement proper locking and synchronization mechanisms in multi-threaded Arrow operations to prevent race conditions within the application using Arrow.
    • Object Lifetime Management: Carefully manage object lifetimes and ensure proper resource cleanup to avoid dangling pointers and use-after-free conditions when working with Arrow objects.
    • Memory Safety Tools: Utilize memory safety tools (e.g., AddressSanitizer) to detect use-after-free vulnerabilities during testing of applications using Arrow.
    • Code Reviews: Conduct thorough code reviews focusing on object lifecycle and concurrency aspects in code that interacts with Arrow.

Threat: Deserialization Vulnerabilities in IPC/Flight Protocol

  • Description: An attacker sends maliciously crafted IPC messages or Flight protocol messages to an application using Arrow. These messages exploit vulnerabilities in Arrow's deserialization logic, such as parsing schema metadata, dictionaries, or data blocks.
  • Impact: Denial of service (application crash, resource exhaustion), information disclosure (reading sensitive data from memory), potentially remote code execution.
  • Affected Arrow Component: Arrow IPC format parsing (cpp/src/arrow/ipc), Arrow Flight server and client implementations (cpp/src/arrow/flight).
  • Risk Severity: Critical
  • Mitigation Strategies:
    • Input Validation: Strictly validate IPC/Flight messages upon reception, including schema, metadata, and data block structure. Implement schema validation and size limits before using Arrow to process them.
    • Secure Deserialization Practices: Rely on Arrow's built-in deserialization functions and avoid implementing custom deserialization logic that might introduce vulnerabilities.
    • Fuzzing IPC/Flight: Fuzz Arrow IPC and Flight implementations with malformed and malicious messages to identify deserialization vulnerabilities within Arrow itself.
    • Network Security: Use secure network protocols (e.g., TLS) for IPC and Flight communication to protect against man-in-the-middle attacks and message tampering when using Arrow Flight.

Threat: Memory Safety Issues in Language Bindings

  • Description: Bugs or vulnerabilities in Arrow language bindings (e.g., Python, Java) when interacting with the Arrow C++ core introduce memory safety issues. This can occur due to incorrect memory management, improper handling of object lifetimes, or errors in the Foreign Function Interface (FFI) layer within the bindings.
  • Impact: Memory corruption, application crash, potentially remote code execution originating from issues in the Arrow bindings.
  • Affected Arrow Component: Arrow language bindings (Python bindings in python/, Java bindings in java/, etc.), Foreign Function Interface (FFI) layers within Arrow bindings.
  • Risk Severity: Critical
  • Mitigation Strategies:
    • Binding Code Reviews: Thoroughly review the code implementing Arrow language bindings, focusing on memory management, FFI interactions, and error handling within the bindings.
    • Memory Safety Tools (in Binding Language): Utilize memory safety tools and linters available for the binding language (e.g., Python's memoryview usage analysis, Java's memory management best practices) when developing with Arrow bindings.
    • Testing Bindings: Extensively test Arrow language bindings with various scenarios, including edge cases and error conditions, to identify memory safety issues in the bindings.
    • Keep Bindings Up-to-Date: Ensure Arrow language bindings are updated to the latest versions to benefit from bug fixes and security patches in the bindings.

Threat: Integer Overflow/Underflow

  • Description: An attacker provides input data that causes integer overflow or underflow during size calculations or index manipulation within Arrow's C++ core. This can be triggered by extremely large datasets or schemas processed by Arrow, leading to incorrect memory allocation or access.
  • Impact: Memory corruption, incorrect data processing by Arrow, denial of service (application crash), potentially information disclosure if memory is accessed out of bounds due to integer issues in Arrow.
  • Affected Arrow Component: Arrow C++ core, particularly memory allocation logic, array indexing, and size calculation functions within cpp/src/arrow/memory and cpp/src/arrow/array.
  • Risk Severity: High
  • Mitigation Strategies:
    • Input Validation: Validate input data sizes and schema complexity to prevent excessively large values that could trigger overflows before processing with Arrow.
    • Safe Integer Operations: While relying on Arrow, be aware of potential integer limits and consider using safe integer arithmetic functions or libraries in application logic interacting with Arrow, where applicable.
    • Code Reviews: Conduct code reviews to identify potential integer overflow/underflow vulnerabilities in code using Arrow APIs, especially when dealing with sizes and indices.
    • Testing with Large Datasets: Test applications with extremely large datasets and schemas when using Arrow to identify potential overflow issues.

Threat: Vulnerabilities in Binding Code (Non-Memory Safety)

  • Description: Security vulnerabilities exist in the code implementing Arrow language bindings themselves, independent of the C++ core, but still part of the Arrow project. These could be logic errors, injection vulnerabilities, or other types of flaws within the binding code that are not directly memory safety related but are still security issues in the Arrow bindings.
  • Impact: Varies depending on the vulnerability, could include information disclosure, data manipulation, or denial of service originating from flaws in Arrow bindings.
  • Affected Arrow Component: Arrow language bindings (Python bindings in python/, Java bindings in java/, etc.).
  • Risk Severity: High
  • Mitigation Strategies:
    • Binding Code Security Audits: Conduct security audits and penetration testing specifically targeting the language binding code of Arrow.
    • Secure Coding Practices: Follow secure coding practices when developing and maintaining language bindings for Arrow.
    • Input Validation in Bindings: Implement input validation and sanitization within the Arrow binding code itself to prevent injection vulnerabilities in the bindings.
    • Static Analysis Tools: Utilize static analysis tools to identify potential vulnerabilities in the Arrow binding code.