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Attack Tree Analysis for unetworking/uwebsockets

Objective: Compromise application using uWebSockets by exploiting vulnerabilities within uWebSockets itself, leading to control over the application or the server it runs on.

Attack Tree Visualization

[CRITICAL NODE] Compromise Application via uWebSockets Vulnerability [CRITICAL NODE] ├───[AND] [CRITICAL NODE] Exploit uWebSockets Vulnerability [CRITICAL NODE] │ ├───[OR] [HIGH-RISK PATH] Exploit Memory Corruption Vulnerability │ │ ├───[AND] [CRITICAL NODE] Trigger Buffer Overflow [CRITICAL NODE] │ │ │ ├───[OR] [HIGH-RISK PATH] Send Oversized HTTP Headers │ │ │ │ └───[LEAF] Send HTTP Request with Headers Exceeding Buffer Limits │ │ │ ├───[OR] [HIGH-RISK PATH] Send Oversized WebSocket Frames │ │ │ │ └───[LEAF] Send WebSocket Message Larger Than Expected Buffer │ ├───[OR] [HIGH-RISK PATH] Exploit Denial of Service (DoS) Vulnerability │ │ ├───[AND] [CRITICAL NODE] Resource Exhaustion [CRITICAL NODE] │ │ │ ├───[OR] [HIGH-RISK PATH] CPU Exhaustion │ │ │ │ └───[LEAF] Send Large Number of Requests Overwhelming CPU │ │ │ ├───[OR] [HIGH-RISK PATH] Memory Exhaustion │ │ │ │ └───[LEAF] Send Requests Leading to Excessive Memory Allocation in uWebSockets │ │ │ ├───[OR] [HIGH-RISK PATH] Network Bandwidth Exhaustion │ │ │ │ └───[LEAF] Send Large Volume of Data to Saturate Network Bandwidth │ └───[AND] [CRITICAL NODE] Application is Vulnerable to Exploitation [CRITICAL NODE] │ └───[OR] [HIGH-RISK PATH] [CRITICAL NODE] Application Does Not Implement Sufficient Input Validation [CRITICAL NODE] │ └───[LEAF] Application Relies Solely on uWebSockets for Security and Does Not Validate Input

Attack Tree Path: Exploit Memory Corruption Vulnerability -> Trigger Buffer Overflow -> Send Oversized HTTP Headers

Attack Vector: Sending HTTP requests with header lines that exceed the buffer size allocated by uWebSockets for storing and processing HTTP headers.

  • Mechanism: If uWebSockets does not properly validate and limit the size of incoming HTTP headers, an attacker can send requests with extremely long headers. When uWebSockets attempts to store these headers in a fixed-size buffer, it can write beyond the buffer's boundaries, leading to a buffer overflow.
  • Potential Impact: Code execution if the overflow overwrites critical memory regions (like return addresses or function pointers), or Denial of Service if the overflow causes a crash or instability.

Attack Tree Path: Exploit Memory Corruption Vulnerability -> Trigger Buffer Overflow -> Send Oversized WebSocket Frames

Attack Vector: Sending WebSocket messages with frame payloads that are larger than the expected or allocated buffer size within uWebSockets for handling WebSocket frames.

  • Mechanism: Similar to HTTP headers, if uWebSockets doesn't enforce proper size limits on incoming WebSocket frames, an attacker can send frames with excessively large payloads. Processing these oversized frames can lead to a buffer overflow when uWebSockets attempts to store or process the payload.
  • Potential Impact: Code execution or Denial of Service, similar to the HTTP header buffer overflow.

Attack Tree Path: Exploit Denial of Service (DoS) Vulnerability -> Resource Exhaustion -> CPU Exhaustion -> Send Large Number of Requests Overwhelming CPU

Attack Vector: Flooding the uWebSockets server with a massive volume of HTTP or WebSocket requests in a short period.

  • Mechanism: By sending a large number of requests, the attacker aims to overwhelm the server's CPU processing capacity. uWebSockets, while performant, still requires CPU cycles to handle each incoming connection, parse requests, and manage connections. If the request rate is high enough, the server will spend all its CPU time processing malicious requests, leaving no resources for legitimate users.
  • Potential Impact: Denial of Service - the server becomes unresponsive to legitimate users due to CPU overload.

Attack Tree Path: Exploit Denial of Service (DoS) Vulnerability -> Resource Exhaustion -> Memory Exhaustion -> Send Requests Leading to Excessive Memory Allocation in uWebSockets

Attack Vector: Sending specific sequences of requests or request types that trigger excessive memory allocation within uWebSockets.

  • Mechanism: This attack exploits potential inefficiencies or vulnerabilities in uWebSockets' memory management. By crafting requests that cause uWebSockets to allocate memory repeatedly without releasing it, or to allocate very large amounts of memory, the attacker can gradually exhaust the server's available memory.
  • Potential Impact: Denial of Service - the server crashes or becomes unresponsive due to out-of-memory (OOM) errors.

Attack Tree Path: Exploit Denial of Service (DoS) Vulnerability -> Resource Exhaustion -> Network Bandwidth Exhaustion -> Send Large Volume of Data to Saturate Network Bandwidth

Attack Vector: Flooding the server with a massive amount of data, regardless of whether it's valid requests or not, to saturate the server's network bandwidth.

  • Mechanism: The attacker sends a high volume of data packets to the server, exceeding the server's network connection capacity. This saturates the network link, preventing legitimate traffic from reaching the server and legitimate responses from being sent out.
  • Potential Impact: Denial of Service - the server becomes unreachable due to network bandwidth saturation.

Attack Tree Path: Application is Vulnerable to Exploitation -> Application Does Not Implement Sufficient Input Validation -> Application Relies Solely on uWebSockets for Security and Does Not Validate Input

Attack Vector: Exploiting vulnerabilities in the application's logic by sending malicious input through uWebSockets that is not properly validated by the application.

  • Mechanism: If the application developers assume that uWebSockets will handle all security concerns and fail to implement their own input validation, the application becomes vulnerable. Attackers can then send crafted payloads via HTTP headers, WebSocket messages, or other channels that uWebSockets handles, and these payloads will be processed directly by the application logic without any security checks.
  • Potential Impact: Application logic compromise, data manipulation, unauthorized access, injection attacks (like SQL injection or command injection if the application processes the unvalidated input in a vulnerable way), and potentially even remote code execution if the application has vulnerabilities that can be triggered by malicious input. This path amplifies the impact of any vulnerability in the application itself, making it a very high-risk scenario.