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Threat Model Analysis for phpdocumentor/reflectioncommon

Threat: Information Disclosure through Reflection

  • Description: An attacker can exploit the application's use of reflection-common to introspect classes, methods, and properties by manipulating input parameters. By providing crafted input, they can force the application to reflect on internal or sensitive code structures, bypassing intended access controls. This allows them to retrieve sensitive information such as internal class names, method signatures, property details, and potentially data embedded in docblocks or comments.
    • Impact: High. Confidentiality breach leading to exposure of sensitive application internals, code structure, and potentially intellectual property. This information can be leveraged for further attacks, reverse engineering, or gaining unauthorized access to sensitive data or functionalities.
    • Affected Component: ReflectionClass, ReflectionMethod, ReflectionProperty and related functions when used to reflect on code elements based on external or untrusted input.
    • Risk Severity: High
    • Mitigation Strategies:
      • Implement strict input validation and sanitization for all inputs used to determine reflection targets.
      • Utilize whitelists of allowed classes, namespaces, or code elements for reflection, avoiding blacklists.
      • Restrict the scope of reflection operations to the absolute minimum required for application functionality.
      • Conduct thorough code reviews focusing on reflection usage to identify and mitigate potential information disclosure vulnerabilities.
      • Avoid exposing reflection functionalities directly to external users or untrusted interfaces.

Threat: Denial of Service (DoS) through Excessive Reflection

  • Description: An attacker can intentionally trigger a large number of resource-intensive reflection operations by sending numerous requests or crafting requests that force the application to perform complex or deep reflection using reflection-common. This can exhaust server resources (CPU, memory) due to the computational cost of reflection, leading to application slowdown, unresponsiveness, or complete service disruption for legitimate users.
    • Impact: High. Availability loss, rendering the application unusable or severely degraded. This can result in significant business disruption, financial losses, and reputational damage. In critical systems, DoS can have severe consequences.
    • Affected Component: Any usage of reflection-common functions (ReflectionClass, ReflectionMethod, etc.) in application paths accessible to attackers, especially if not properly resource-managed or exposed to external input.
    • Risk Severity: High
    • Mitigation Strategies:
      • Implement robust rate limiting on API endpoints or functionalities that utilize reflection, especially those exposed to external or untrusted sources.
      • Set and enforce resource limits (memory limits, execution time limits) for processes performing reflection operations.
      • Implement caching mechanisms for reflection results to avoid redundant and costly reflection operations, especially for frequently accessed code elements.
      • Thoroughly performance test application components that use reflection under expected and attack-scenario loads to identify and address potential DoS vulnerabilities.
      • Consider asynchronous or background processing for heavy reflection tasks to minimize impact on user-facing application responsiveness.

Threat: Bypass of Intended Access Controls (via Reflection)

  • Description: An attacker who can trigger reflection operations, either directly or indirectly through application vulnerabilities, can use reflection-common to bypass intended access modifiers (e.g., private, protected). By using methods like ReflectionProperty::setAccessible(true), they can gain unauthorized access to and potentially modify private or protected properties and methods, directly undermining the intended security and encapsulation mechanisms of the application's code.
    • Impact: High. Integrity and Confidentiality breach. Bypassing access controls can lead to unauthorized access to sensitive data intended to be protected by access modifiers, and potentially allow modification of application state or execution paths that should be restricted. This can result in data corruption, unauthorized actions, or further exploitation.
    • Affected Component: Usage of ReflectionProperty::setAccessible(true), ReflectionMethod::setAccessible(true), or similar functionalities within reflection-common that are used to bypass access modifiers in a security-sensitive context.
    • Risk Severity: High
    • Mitigation Strategies:
      • Do not rely solely on access modifiers as a primary security mechanism, especially in applications that utilize reflection. Implement robust security checks and validation logic that are independent of access modifiers.
      • Strictly control and limit access to functionalities that utilize reflection, particularly in production environments. Ensure that only authorized and trusted parts of the application can trigger reflection operations that bypass access controls.
      • Minimize the use of setAccessible(true) and similar methods that bypass access controls. If necessary for specific use cases (e.g., testing), ensure it is done in a highly controlled and secure manner and is not exposed to untrusted users or external interfaces.
      • Conduct regular security audits and penetration testing to identify potential vulnerabilities arising from the misuse of reflection to bypass access controls.