CVE-2021-23807

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DescriptionStatementAdditional informationCVSS Score DetailsWeakness (CWE)FAQ

Description

A Type Confusion vulnerability was found in node-jsonpointer. This issue leads to the bypass of a previous Prototype Pollution fix when the pointer components are arrays. This flaw allows an attacker to use objects of incompatible base types, leading to remote code execution. The highest threat from this vulnerability is to confidentiality, integrity, as well as system availability.

A Type Confusion vulnerability was found in node-jsonpointer. This issue leads to the bypass of a previous Prototype Pollution fix when the pointer components are arrays. This flaw allows an attacker to use objects of incompatible base types, leading to remote code execution. The highest threat from this vulnerability is to confidentiality, integrity, as well as system availability.

Statement

In Red Hat Quay, JSON pointer is a development dependency, therefore the impact of this flaw is rated Low. A fix may be delivered in future Quay updates. Hadoop-container is affected, but it's deprecated since OpenShift Container Platform 4.6, hence marked as WONTFIX.

In Red Hat Quay, JSON pointer is a development dependency, therefore the impact of this flaw is rated Low. A fix may be delivered in future Quay updates.

Hadoop-container is affected, but it's deprecated since OpenShift Container Platform 4.6, hence marked as WONTFIX.

Additional information

  • Bugzilla 2020365: nodejs-jsonpointer: type confusion vulnerability can lead to a bypass of a previous prototype pollution fix when the pointer components are arrays
  • CWE-915: Improperly Controlled Modification of Dynamically-Determined Object Attributes
  • FAQ: Frequently asked questions about CVE-2021-23807

Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) Score Details

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).

The following CVSS metrics and score provided are preliminary and subject to review.

CVSS v3 Score Breakdown
Red HatNVD

CVSS v3 Base Score

7.3

9.8

Attack Vector

Network

Network

Attack Complexity

Low

Low

Privileges Required

None

None

User Interaction

None

None

Scope

Unchanged

Unchanged

Confidentiality Impact

Low

High

Integrity Impact

Low

High

Availability Impact

Low

High

CVSS v3 Vector

Red Hat: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:L

NVD: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Red Hat CVSS v3 Score Explanation

The Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability metrics should be reduced to Low value, because: - Successful exploitation may lead to some loss of confidentiality, but it's not under attacker control what information will be obtained. - Like above, potentially an attacker may be able to modify some data, but does not have control over the consequences of that modification. - An attacker is not able to determine if successful exploitation will affect the availability of the target environment. There may appear some performance reduction due to additional errors handling (more resources consumption) but overall there is no direct impact to the availability of the target environment. Even if repeated exploitation of the vulnerability is possible, the attacker does not have the ability to completely deny service to legitimate users.

The Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability metrics should be reduced to Low value, because:

  • Successful exploitation may lead to some loss of confidentiality, but it's not under attacker control what information will be obtained.
  • Like above, potentially an attacker may be able to modify some data, but does not have control over the consequences of that modification.
  • An attacker is not able to determine if successful exploitation will affect the availability of the target environment. There may appear some performance reduction due to additional errors handling (more resources consumption) but overall there is no direct impact to the availability of the target environment. Even if repeated exploitation of the vulnerability is possible, the attacker does not have the ability to completely deny service to legitimate users.

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is Red Hat's CVSS v3 score or Impact different from other vendors?

For open source software shipped by multiple vendors, the CVSS base scores may vary for each vendor's version depending on the version they ship, how they ship it, the platform, and even how the software is compiled. This makes scoring of vulnerabilities difficult for third-party vulnerability databases such as NVD that only provide a single CVSS base score for each vulnerability. Red Hat scores reflect how a vulnerability affects our products specifically.

For more information, see https://access.redhat.com/solutions/762393.

My product is listed as "Under investigation" or "Affected", when will Red Hat release a fix for this vulnerability?

  • "Under investigation" doesn't necessarily mean that the product is affected by this vulnerability. It only means that our Analysis Team is still working on determining whether the product is affected and how it is affected.
  • "Affected" means that our Analysis Team has determined that this product is affected by this vulnerability and might release a fix to address this in the near future.

What can I do if my product is listed as "Will not fix"?

A "will not fix" status means that a fix for an affected product version is not planned or not possible due to complexity, which may create additional risk.

Available options depend mostly on the Impact of the vulnerability and the current Life Cycle phase of your product. Overall, you have the following options:
  • Upgrade to a supported product version that includes a fix for this vulnerability (recommended).
  • Apply a mitigation (if one exists).
  • Open a support case to request a prioritization of releasing a fix for this vulnerability.

What can I do if my product is listed as "Fix deferred"?

A deferred status means that a fix for an affected product version is not guaranteed due to higher-priority development work.

Available options depend mostly on the Impact of the vulnerability and the current Life Cycle phase of your product. Overall, you have the following options:
  • Apply a mitigation (if one exists).
  • Open a support case to request a prioritization of releasing a fix for this vulnerability.
  • Red Hat Engineering focuses on addressing high-priority issues based on their complexity or limited lifecycle support. Therefore, lower-priority issues will not receive immediate fixes.

What is a mitigation?

A mitigation is an action that can be taken to reduce the impact of a security vulnerability, without deploying any fixes.

I have a Red Hat product but it is not in the above list, is it affected?

The listed products were found to include one or more of the components that this vulnerability affects. These products underwent a thorough evaluation to determine their affectedness by this vulnerability. Note that layered products (such as container-based offerings) that consume affected components from any of the products listed in this table may be affected and are not represented.

Why is my security scanner reporting my product as vulnerable to this vulnerability even though my product version is fixed or not affected?

In order to maintain code stability and compatibility, Red Hat usually does not rebase packages to entirely new versions. Instead, we backport fixes and new features to an older version of the package we distribute. This can result in some security scanners that only consider the package version to report the package as vulnerable. To avoid this, we suggest that you use an approved vulnerability scanner from our Red Hat Vulnerability Scanner Certification program.

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