vulnerabilities-workflow-1.md

Here is the combined list of vulnerabilities, formatted as markdown with main paragraphs and subparagraphs for each vulnerability, with duplicate vulnerabilities removed.

Combined Vulnerability List

1. Integer Overflow in Message Size Calculation leading to SQL Injection (CVE-2024-27304)

• Description:

  1. A threat actor crafts a single SQL query or bind message exceeding 4 GB in size.
  2. Due to an integer overflow in the message size calculation within pgx versions prior to 5.5.4, the large message's size is incorrectly calculated.
  3. This incorrect size calculation leads to the oversized message being fragmented and sent as multiple smaller messages.
  4. The attacker gains control over these fragmented messages, enabling them to inject malicious SQL commands within the message stream.
  5. When the server processes these fragmented messages, the injected SQL is executed, resulting in a SQL injection vulnerability.

• Impact:

  • Critical. Successful exploitation allows for arbitrary SQL injection, potentially leading to full database compromise, data exfiltration, modification, or deletion.

• Vulnerability Rank: critical

• Currently Implemented Mitigations:

  • Mitigated: This vulnerability is fixed in pgx version 5.5.4 and later. The fix is mentioned in CHANGELOG.md under version 5.5.4 with the title "Fix CVE-2024-27304". The specific code changes are not included in the provided PROJECT FILES, but the changelog entry confirms the mitigation.

• Missing Mitigations:

  • No further mitigations are needed as the vulnerability is already addressed in the latest versions. Users should upgrade to pgx v5.5.4 or later.

• Preconditions:

  • The application must be using a pgx version prior to 5.5.4.
  • An attacker needs to be able to send a crafted query or bind message larger than 4GB to the application that uses pgx to communicate with PostgreSQL.

• Source Code Analysis:

  • The provided PROJECT FILES do not contain the specific code where the integer overflow occurred and was fixed. However, the CHANGELOG.md clearly indicates that CVE-2024-27304 was addressed in version 5.5.4.
  • To understand the root cause, one would need to examine the code diff between pgx v5.5.3 and v5.5.4, specifically looking at how message size calculations are handled, especially for large queries and bind messages within the pgproto3 package, which is responsible for encoding and decoding the PostgreSQL wire protocol. It is likely that the fix involved changing the data type used for message size calculation to a larger integer type (e.g., from int32 to int64) to prevent overflow when dealing with messages exceeding 4GB.

• Security Test Case:

  1. Setup: Use a pgx version prior to 5.5.4 in a test environment connected to a PostgreSQL database.
  2. Craft Malicious Payload: Construct a SQL query or bind message that is larger than 4GB. This payload should include a malicious SQL injection part, for example, a SELECT statement that attempts to extract sensitive data or modify data. The exact method to create a >4GB message will depend on PostgreSQL and pgx protocol details. It might involve extremely long strings or binary data.
  3. Send Payload: Send this crafted payload to the application which uses the vulnerable pgx library to communicate with the PostgreSQL database.
  4. Verify Exploitation: Check if the malicious SQL injection was executed on the database server. This can be verified by observing database logs, checking for data modifications, or confirming data exfiltration if the injected SQL was designed to do so. For instance, if the injected SQL was intended to create a new user with admin privileges, attempt to log in with those new credentials.
  5. Expected Result (Vulnerable Version): The malicious SQL injection should be successful, proving the vulnerability.
  6. Test Fixed Version: Repeat steps 1-4 with pgx version 5.5.4 or later.
  7. Expected Result (Fixed Version): The malicious SQL injection should fail, and the application should handle large messages correctly without allowing SQL injection, confirming the mitigation.

2. Potential SQL Injection in Simple Protocol due to Incomplete Sanitization

• Description:

  1. An attacker crafts a malicious SQL query designed to exploit vulnerabilities in simple protocol sanitization.
  2. The attacker uses specific characters or sequences that are not properly escaped or handled by the sanitize.SanitizeSQL function, potentially bypassing the intended sanitization.
  3. If the crafted query is executed using the simple protocol (QueryExecModeSimpleProtocol), the malicious SQL code could be injected and executed by the PostgreSQL server.

• Impact: SQL Injection, allowing attackers to read, modify, or delete data, or execute arbitrary SQL commands.

• Vulnerability Rank: High

• Currently Implemented Mitigations:

  • pgx uses internal/sanitize.SanitizeSQL for simple protocol query sanitization.
  • Version 5.5.5 CHANGELOG mentions "Use spaces instead of parentheses for SQL sanitization.", indicating an attempt to strengthen sanitization.

• Missing Mitigations:

  • Current sanitization in internal/sanitize.SanitizeSQL might be incomplete, especially against sophisticated injection attempts.
  • Lack of comprehensive testing for simple protocol sanitization against various SQL injection vectors.

• Preconditions:

  • Application uses QueryExecModeSimpleProtocol.
  • Application constructs SQL queries dynamically based on user input and uses simple protocol to execute them.
  • standard_conforming_strings is set to on and client_encoding is set to UTF8 as required by simple protocol.

• Source Code Analysis:

  • Analyze internal/sanitize/sanitize.go and conn.go's sanitizeForSimpleQuery function.
  • Verify the effectiveness of sanitize.SanitizeSQL against known SQL injection techniques, especially around edge cases and complex queries.
  • Check if all special characters and SQL keywords are properly escaped or handled.
  • Review the changes introduced in version 5.5.5 to understand the extent and limitations of the sanitization improvements.

• Security Test Case:

  1. Set up a PostgreSQL server and a pgx application configured to use QueryExecModeSimpleProtocol.
  2. Identify SQL injection vectors that might bypass sanitize.SanitizeSQL. Examples could include:
     • Exploiting encoding issues.
     • Using specific SQL functions or operators that are not correctly sanitized.
     • Crafting queries with unusual syntax or edge cases.
  3. Construct a malicious SQL query incorporating these vectors and user-controlled input.
  4. Execute the crafted query through the pgx application using QueryExecModeSimpleProtocol.
  5. Observe if the SQL injection is successful. For example, try to bypass authentication, read unauthorized data, or modify data.
  6. If injection is successful, this confirms a vulnerability in simple protocol sanitization.
  7. Develop more robust sanitization logic or recommend against using QueryExecModeSimpleProtocol with dynamic queries based on untrusted input. Consider enforcing the use of prepared statements even in simple protocol if possible.

3. Insufficient Input Validation in Circle Type Text Parsing

• Description:

  1. The scanPlanTextAnyToCircleScanner.Scan function in pgtype/circle.go parses circle type from text format.
  2. The function performs a basic length check (len(src) < 9) but lacks comprehensive validation of the input string format.
  3. Specifically, it assumes a fixed format <(x,y),r> and uses hardcoded indexing (e.g., src[2:]) and strings.IndexByte to extract x, y, and r values.
  4. This assumption allows a threat actor to provide specially crafted input strings that deviate from the expected format, potentially bypassing the intended parsing logic.
  5. For example, input like <prefix<(x,y),r>> or <(x,y),r>suffix might be processed incorrectly or lead to unexpected errors.
  6. While not directly leading to SQL injection in this specific function, insufficient input validation can be a security concern and may be exploitable in combination with other vulnerabilities or future code changes.

• Impact:

  • High. Although currently limited to potential parsing errors and incorrect data handling, this vulnerability could be escalated to more severe issues like data corruption or unexpected application behavior if combined with other weaknesses or future code modifications. Lack of input validation is a common source of vulnerabilities.

• Vulnerability Rank: high

• Currently Implemented Mitigations:

  • No. The code performs minimal length validation but lacks format validation.

• Missing Mitigations:

  • Input validation for the circle text format in scanPlanTextAnyToCircleScanner.Scan should be improved to strictly adhere to the expected format <(x,y),r>.
  • Implement robust parsing logic, potentially using regular expressions or more structured parsing techniques to ensure that the input string conforms to the expected format before extracting values.
  • Reject inputs that do not strictly match the expected format.

• Preconditions:

  • The application uses pgtype.Circle and allows user-controlled input to be scanned into a Circle type from text format.
  • The attacker needs to provide a crafted text input for the circle type that deviates from the expected format <(x,y),r>.

• Source Code Analysis:

  // /code/pgtype/circle.go
  func (scanPlanTextAnyToCircleScanner) Scan(src []byte, dst any) error {
      scanner := (dst).(CircleScanner)
  
      if src == nil {
          return scanner.ScanCircle(Circle{})
      }
  
      if len(src) < 9 { // Minimal length check - insufficient validation
          return fmt.Errorf("invalid length for Circle: %v", len(src))
      }
  
      str := string(src[2:]) // Assumes '(' is always at index 1 - not validated
      end := strings.IndexByte(str, ',')
      x, err := strconv.ParseFloat(str[:end], 64)
      if err != nil {
          return err
      }
  
      str = str[end+1:]
      end = strings.IndexByte(str, ')')
  
      y, err := strconv.ParseFloat(str[:end], 64)
      if err != nil {
          return err
      }
  
      str = str[end+2 : len(str)-1] // Assumes ',' and ')' are at fixed positions - not validated
  
      r, err := strconv.ParseFloat(str, 64)
      if err != nil {
          return err
      }
  
      return scanner.ScanCircle(Circle{P: Vec2{x, y}, R: r, Valid: true})
  }

  • The code directly accesses string indices and uses strings.IndexByte based on assumptions about the input format.
  • It does not validate the presence of '<', '(', ',', ')', and '>' characters at the expected positions.
  • The parsing logic is brittle and can be easily bypassed with format variations.

• Security Test Case:

  1. Set up a PostgreSQL server and use the current version of pgx.
  2. Develop a Go application that uses pgtype.Circle to scan user-provided text input into a Circle value.
  3. Craft various malicious input strings for the circle type that deviate from the expected format <(x,y),r>, such as:
     • prefix<(1,2),3>
     • <(1,2),3>suffix
     • <(1,2),3> (leading spaces)
     • <(1,2),3> (trailing spaces)
     • invalid_prefix<(1,2),3>
     • <(1,2),3>invalid_suffix
     • <(1,2),3>malicious_sql_injection-- (attempt to inject SQL, although unlikely to be directly exploitable here, it highlights the lack of robust parsing)
  4. Send these crafted input strings to the Go application and observe the behavior.
  5. Verify if the application correctly parses valid inputs and rejects or handles invalidly formatted inputs gracefully without unexpected errors or misinterpretations.
  6. Confirm that invalid inputs are not parsed as valid circles and do not lead to unexpected behavior in the application. For example, check if parsing errors are returned when invalid formats are provided.