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Reading specially crafted serializable objects from an untrusted source may cause an infinite loop and denial of service

High severity GitHub Reviewed Published Feb 29, 2024 to the GitHub Advisory Database • Updated Aug 13, 2024

Package

maven org.clojure:clojure (Maven)

Affected versions

>= 1.7.0, < 1.11.2
>= 1.12.0-alpha1, < 1.12.0-alpha9

Patched versions

1.11.2
1.12.0-alpha9

Description

Any program on the JVM may read serialized objects via java.io.ObjectInputStream.readObject(). Reading serialized objects from an untrusted source is inherently unsafe (this affects any program running on any version of the JVM) and is a prerequisite for this vulnerability.

Clojure classes that represent infinite seqs (Cycle, infinite Repeat, and Iterate) do not define hashCode() and use the parent ASeq.hashCode(), which walks the seq to compute the hash, yielding an infinite loop. Classes like java.util.HashMap call hashCode() on keys during deserialization of a serialized map.

The exploit requires:

  1. Crafting a serialized HashMap object with an infinite seq object as a key.
  2. Sending that to a program that reads serialized objects via ObjectInputStream.readObject().

This will cause the program to enter an infinite loop on the reading thread and thus a denial of service (DoS).

The affected Clojure classes (Cycle, Repeat, Iterate) exist in Clojure 1.7.0-1.11.1, 1.12.0-alpha1-1.12.0-alpha8.

References

Published by the National Vulnerability Database Feb 29, 2024
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Feb 29, 2024
Reviewed Mar 1, 2024
Last updated Aug 13, 2024

Severity

High

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Network
Attack complexity
Low
Privileges required
None
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
High

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

EPSS score

0.045%
(17th percentile)

Weaknesses

CVE ID

CVE-2024-22871

GHSA ID

GHSA-vr64-r9qj-h27f

Source code

Credits

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