CWE-693: Protection Mechanism Failure

What is Protection Mechanism Failure?

• Overview: Protection Mechanism Failure (CWE-693) occurs when a product fails to implement or improperly applies a security mechanism meant to defend against targeted attacks. This can happen if the mechanism is missing, insufficient, or ignored in certain parts of the code.

• Exploitation Methods:

• Attackers can exploit missing or improperly implemented security mechanisms to gain unauthorized access, execute code, or exfiltrate data.
• Common attack patterns include bypassing authentication, exploiting insufficient input validation, or manipulating session management.

• Security Impact:

• Direct consequences include unauthorized data access, privilege escalation, or system compromise.
• Potential cascading effects could lead to further exploitation of the system, data breaches, and loss of customer trust.
• Business impact may involve regulatory fines, financial loss, and damage to the organization's reputation.

• Prevention Guidelines:

• Ensure that all security mechanisms are properly implemented and consistently applied across the codebase.
• Follow security best practices such as regular code reviews, penetration testing, and threat modeling.
• Use recommended tools and frameworks that provide robust security features and keep them up-to-date with the latest patches.

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Technical Details

Likelihood of Exploit: Not specified

Affected Languages: Not Language-Specific

Affected Technologies: Not Technology-Specific, ICS/OT

Vulnerable Code Example

import hashlib

def hash_password(password):
    # Vulnerable: Using a simple hash function (MD5) for password hashing
    hashed_password = hashlib.md5(password.encode()).hexdigest()  # MD5 is not secure
    return hashed_password

print(hash_password("my_secure_password"))

Explanation:

• Line 12-13: This code uses MD5 for password hashing, which is considered insecure due to its vulnerability to collision attacks. An attacker can easily generate the same hash with a different input, compromising password integrity. MD5 is also fast, making it susceptible to brute-force attacks.

How to fix Protection Mechanism Failure?

To fix this vulnerability, we need to replace the insecure MD5 hashing function with a more secure hashing mechanism. Use a password hashing library such as bcrypt or argon2 that incorporates salt and multiple iterations to make the hash computation more secure against brute-force and rainbow table attacks.

Steps to fix:

1. Use a Strong Hashing Algorithm: Replace MD5 with bcrypt or argon2, which are specifically designed for securely hashing passwords.
2. Introduce Salting: Ensure that unique salts are used for each password to prevent rainbow table attacks.
3. Apply Iterations: Use multiple iterations to increase the time required to compute the hash, thereby slowing down any potential brute-force attacks.

Fixed Code Example

import bcrypt

def hash_password(password):
    # Secure: Using bcrypt for password hashing
    # bcrypt automatically handles salting and applies a work factor
    hashed_password = bcrypt.hashpw(password.encode(), bcrypt.gensalt())  # Secure hash
    return hashed_password

print(hash_password("my_secure_password"))

Explanation:

• Line 12-16: Replaced the vulnerable MD5 hashing with bcrypt, which automatically handles salting and uses a configurable work factor to make the password hashing process more resistant to attacks. This provides a robust mechanism that significantly increases security by leveraging modern cryptographic practices. bcrypt is intentionally slow, which helps mitigate brute-force attacks by increasing the computational effort required to crack the password.