CVE-2015-0293
Description
A denial of service flaw was found in the way OpenSSL handled SSLv2 handshake messages. A remote attacker could use this flaw to cause a TLS/SSL server using OpenSSL to exit on a failed assertion if it had both the SSLv2 protocol and EXPORT-grade cipher suites enabled.
Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) Score Details
Info alert:Important note
CVSS scores for open source components depend on vendor-specific factors (e.g. version or build chain). Therefore, Red Hat's score and impact rating can be different from NVD and other vendors. Red Hat remains the authoritative CVE Naming Authority (CNA) source for its products and services (see Red Hat classifications).
CVSS v2 Score Breakdown
| Red Hat | NVD | cve.org | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Base Score | 4.3 | 5 | N/A |
| Attack Vector | Network | Network | N/A |
| Access Complexity | Medium | Low | N/A |
| Authentication | None | None | N/A |
| Confidentiality Impact | None | None | N/A |
| Integrity Impact | None | None | N/A |
| Availability Impact | Partial | Partial | N/A |
Vector
Red Hat: AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P
NVD: AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:N/I:N/A:P
Understanding the Weakness (CWE)
Availability
Technical Impact: DoS: Crash, Exit, or Restart
While assertion is good for catching logic errors and reducing the chances of reaching more serious vulnerability conditions, an attacker can still cause a denial of service if they can trigger an assert statement, and if the scope of the assert() extends beyond the attacker's own session. For example, if a server handles multiple simultaneous connections, if an assert() occurs in one single connection that causes all other connections to be dropped, this could be a significant denial of service.
Acknowledgements
Red Hat would like to thank the OpenSSL project for reporting this issue. Upstream acknowledges Emilia Käsper (the OpenSSL development team) and Sean Burford (Google) as the original reporters.
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