attack-surface.md

Attack Surface Analysis for rwf2/rocket

Attack Surface: Route Parameter Injection

• Description: Attackers manipulate route parameters, a core feature of Rocket's routing, to inject malicious payloads. This is critical when Rocket application code directly uses these parameters in sensitive operations without proper validation, leading to unintended actions or information disclosure.

  • Rocket Contribution: Rocket's routing system, with its ease of capturing URL parameters, directly facilitates this attack surface if developers don't implement robust input validation and sanitization. The framework's design encourages parameter usage, making developers responsible for secure handling.

  • Example: An application using a route like /files/<filename> to serve files. Without validation, an attacker could request /files/../../etc/passwd to access sensitive system files (Local File Inclusion).

  • Impact:

    • Local File Inclusion (LFI)
    • Remote File Inclusion (RFI)
    • Command Injection
    • SQL Injection
    • Data Breach
    • System Compromise

  • Risk Severity: Critical

  • Mitigation Strategies:

    • Strict Input Validation: Mandatory and rigorous validation of all route parameters against expected formats and values. Use whitelisting.
    • Parameter Sanitization/Encoding: Always sanitize or encode route parameters before using them in file system operations, system commands, or database queries.
    • Parameterized Queries (SQL): Enforce the use of parameterized queries or prepared statements to prevent SQL injection when route parameters are used in database interactions.
    • Principle of Least Privilege: Run the Rocket application with the minimum necessary privileges to limit the damage from successful exploitation.

Attack Surface: Request Guard Vulnerabilities

• Description: Security flaws in custom Request Guards, Rocket's mechanism for request validation and authorization, can lead to critical authentication or authorization bypasses. This allows unauthorized access to protected resources or functionalities.

  • Rocket Contribution: Rocket's Request Guard system is central to its security model. Vulnerabilities in custom guards, which developers are expected to create for specific application needs, directly undermine the intended security controls enforced by the framework.

  • Example: A flawed custom Request Guard designed to enforce admin privileges might contain a logical error, allowing regular users to bypass the guard and access admin-only routes.

  • Impact:

    • Authentication Bypass
    • Authorization Bypass
    • Privilege Escalation
    • Complete compromise of protected resources and functionalities.

  • Risk Severity: Critical

  • Mitigation Strategies:

    • Secure Request Guard Development: Implement Request Guards with extreme care, adhering to secure coding principles. Focus on robust authentication and authorization logic.
    • Mandatory Code Review: Require rigorous security-focused code reviews for all custom Request Guard implementations by experienced security personnel.
    • Comprehensive Unit Testing: Develop extensive unit tests specifically targeting Request Guards to verify their intended security behavior and identify potential bypasses. Include negative test cases to check for vulnerabilities.
    • Principle of Least Privilege (Guard Design): Design guards to be as simple and focused as possible to reduce complexity and the likelihood of introducing vulnerabilities.

Attack Surface: Form/Data Deserialization Issues (Specifically Deserialization Vulnerabilities)

• Description: Critical vulnerabilities arising from unsafe deserialization of request data (Forms, JSON, etc.) handled by Rocket. While Rust's memory safety reduces some risks, logical deserialization flaws or vulnerabilities in dependencies can still lead to severe consequences.

  • Rocket Contribution: Rocket provides built-in mechanisms (Form, Json, Data) for deserializing various data formats. If applications rely on potentially unsafe deserialization practices or fail to validate deserialized data adequately, they become vulnerable.

  • Example: Although less common in Rust for direct RCE, vulnerabilities in JSON deserialization libraries used by Rocket (or indirectly by application code) could potentially be exploited with crafted JSON payloads to cause denial of service, data corruption, or in rarer cases, code execution if unsafe deserialization patterns are present in dependencies or custom code.

  • Impact:

    • Deserialization Vulnerabilities (Potential for Remote Code Execution - RCE, Denial of Service, Data Corruption)
    • Validation Bypass
    • Data Corruption
    • Denial of Service (DoS)

  • Risk Severity: High (Can be Critical if RCE is demonstrably possible, otherwise High for DoS or Data Corruption potential)

  • Mitigation Strategies:

    • Prioritize Safe Deserialization: Strictly adhere to Rocket's recommended data handling practices and avoid any potentially unsafe deserialization methods.
    • Mandatory Data Validation: Implement strong validation for all deserialized data. Validate data types, formats, ranges, and all relevant business logic constraints after deserialization.
    • Input Size Limits: Enforce strict limits on the size of incoming requests to mitigate potential Denial of Service attacks through resource exhaustion during deserialization.
    • Regular Dependency Audits and Updates: Conduct regular security audits of Rocket's dependencies and keep them updated to patch any known deserialization vulnerabilities in underlying libraries.

Attack Surface: Dependency Vulnerabilities (Critical Severity in Rocket's Dependencies)

• Description: Critical vulnerabilities discovered in third-party libraries (crates) that Rocket directly depends upon. These vulnerabilities can have a severe and direct impact on Rocket applications, even if the application code itself is secure.

  • Rocket Contribution: Rocket's architecture relies on a set of external crates. Critical vulnerabilities in these core dependencies directly translate to critical vulnerabilities in any Rocket application using those dependencies.

  • Example: A critical vulnerability in a core Rust crate used by Rocket for HTTP parsing, TLS handling, or other fundamental functionalities could be exploited to compromise Rocket applications at a fundamental level. This could include remote code execution, man-in-the-middle attacks, or complete service disruption.

  • Impact:

    • Remote Code Execution (RCE)
    • Man-in-the-Middle Attacks
    • Denial of Service (DoS)
    • Data Breach
    • Complete Application Compromise

  • Risk Severity: Critical

  • Mitigation Strategies:

    • Proactive Dependency Management: Implement a robust dependency management strategy using cargo and related tools.
    • Immediate Dependency Updates: Establish a process for promptly updating Rocket and all its dependencies whenever security advisories are released for critical vulnerabilities.
    • Automated Vulnerability Scanning: Integrate automated vulnerability scanning tools (like cargo audit and other dependency scanners) into the development and CI/CD pipelines to continuously monitor dependencies for known vulnerabilities.
    • Security Monitoring and Alerts: Subscribe to security advisories specifically for Rocket and its direct dependencies to receive immediate notifications of critical vulnerabilities.
    • Dependency Pinning and Review (with caution): While generally discouraged for security updates, in specific, well-justified cases, dependency pinning combined with rigorous security review of pinned versions might be considered, but only with a strong process for future updates.

Attack Surface: Concurrency Bugs in Application Logic (Leading to Critical State Corruption)

• Description: Critical concurrency bugs, such as race conditions, within the application's code that leverages Rocket's asynchronous nature. These bugs can lead to severe state corruption, data integrity issues, or critical security bypasses. While Rust mitigates memory safety issues, logical concurrency errors in application logic remain a significant risk.

  • Rocket Contribution: Rocket's asynchronous framework encourages concurrent programming. If developers are not highly proficient in asynchronous and concurrent programming in Rust, they can introduce critical concurrency bugs in their application logic when handling requests concurrently within Rocket's async environment.

  • Example: A race condition in order processing logic within a Rocket-based e-commerce application could allow attackers to manipulate order quantities, payment amounts, or inventory levels by sending concurrent requests in a precisely timed manner, leading to significant financial loss or system disruption.

  • Impact:

    • Critical Data Corruption
    • Inconsistent System State
    • Financial Loss
    • Severe Business Logic Flaws
    • Potential for Authentication/Authorization Bypasses in specific scenarios

  • Risk Severity: High (Can escalate to Critical depending on the business impact of state corruption)

  • Mitigation Strategies:

    • Expert Concurrency Programming: Ensure developers working with Rocket's asynchronous features have strong expertise in concurrent programming principles and Rust's concurrency primitives.
    • Rigorous Concurrency Testing: Implement extensive testing specifically focused on concurrency, including stress testing, race condition detection, and scenario-based testing of concurrent workflows.
    • Code Reviews by Concurrency Experts: Mandatory code reviews by developers with deep expertise in concurrent Rust programming for all code sections involving asynchronous operations and shared mutable state.
    • Minimize Shared Mutable State: Design application architecture to minimize shared mutable state in concurrent contexts. Favor immutable data structures, message passing, and actor-based models where appropriate to reduce the risk of race conditions.
    • Use Rust's Concurrency Tools Safely: Utilize Rust's concurrency primitives (Mutex, RwLock, Channels, Atomics) correctly and with a thorough understanding of their behavior and potential pitfalls.