PT-2023-32574 · Candid+1 · Candid+1

Venkkatesh-Sekar

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Published

2023-12-08

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Updated

2023-12-13

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CVE-2023-6245

CVSS v3.1

7.5

High

VectorAV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H
Name of the Vulnerable Software and Affected Versions Candid versions 0.9.0 through 0.9.9 dfx versions 0.14.4 through 0.15.2-beta.0
Description The Candid library causes a Denial of Service while parsing a specially crafted payload with empty data type. For example, if the payload is record { * ; empty } and the canister interface expects record { * }, then the Rust candid decoder treats empty as an extra field required by the type. The problem with the type empty is that the Candid Rust library wrongly categorizes empty as a recoverable error when skipping the field, thus causing an infinite decoding loop. Canisters using affected versions of Candid are exposed to denial of service by causing the decoding to run indefinitely until the canister traps due to reaching the maximum instruction limit per execution round. Repeated exposure to the payload will result in degraded performance of the canister.
Recommendations For Candid versions 0.9.0 through 0.9.9, upgrade the Candid version to 0.9.10 or later. For dfx versions 0.14.4 through 0.15.2-beta.0, upgrade dfx to version 0.15.2 or later. As a temporary workaround, consider restricting access to the vulnerable Candid library until a patch is available.

Fix

Infinite Loop

Resource Exhaustion

RCE

Related Identifiers

CVE-2023-6245
GHSA-7787-P7X6-FQ3J
RUSTSEC-2023-0073

Affected Products

Candid
Dfx