CWE-769: DEPRECATED: Uncontrolled File Descriptor Consumption
Learn about CWE-769 (DEPRECATED: Uncontrolled File Descriptor Consumption), its security impact, exploitation methods, and prevention guidelines.
What is DEPRECATED: Uncontrolled File Descriptor Consumption?
• Overview: CWE-769 was a classification for vulnerabilities where there was uncontrolled consumption of file descriptors, leading to resource exhaustion. It has been deprecated and merged into CWE-774, which covers similar issues related to resource management.
• Exploitation Methods:
- Attackers can exploit this vulnerability by opening numerous file descriptors without closing them, leading to exhaustion of available file descriptors.
- Common attack patterns include denial of service (DoS) attacks where the system cannot open new files or network connections because all file descriptors are consumed.
• Security Impact:
- Direct consequences include system instability or crashes due to resource exhaustion.
- Potential cascading effects can include denial of service to legitimate users and application failures.
- Business impact may involve downtime, loss of service availability, and potential reputational damage.
• Prevention Guidelines:
- Specific code-level fixes include ensuring that file descriptors are always closed after use, using try-finally blocks or automatic resource management features in languages that support them.
- Security best practices involve implementing limits on the number of file descriptors an application can open and monitoring resource usage.
- Recommended tools and frameworks may include static analysis tools to detect leaks and resource management libraries that automatically handle file descriptors.
Technical Details
Likelihood of Exploit: Not specified
Affected Languages: Not specified
Affected Technologies: Not specified