CVE-2007-1862

CVE: CVE-2007-1862
CWE: 825
ipc:
  note: 
  answer: 
  question: |
    Did the feature that this vulnerability affected use inter-process
    communication? IPC includes OS signals, pipes, stdin/stdout, message
    passing, and clipboard. Writing to files that another program in this
    software system reads is another form of IPC.

    Answer should be boolean. Explain your answer
bugs: []
i18n:
  note: 
  answer: 
  instructions: |
    Was the feature impacted by this vulnerability about internationalization
    (i18n)? An internationalization feature is one that enables people from all
    over the world to use the system. This includes translations, locales,
    typography, unicode, or various other features.

    Answer should be boolean. Write a note about how you came to the conclusions
    you did.
repo: 
vccs:
- note: Formerly 3ec94037b949d61e574dfef9c05fea61e02a6547 before HTTPD rewrote Git
    history.
  commit: 69604bb42c6b3ec7b799b8938694ac8eb9049460
- note: 
  commit: 
fixes:
- note: Formerly 0fcdd1e21cd2f75c1887e7872e5f0ca79a51f8f4 before HTTPD rewrote Git
    history.
  commit: 9a29cd5f657671998da41c51e1933d23312ad310
- note: Formerly a2abc64b699ac0ec03bb93253fa13206c0a9f242 before HTTPD rewrote Git
    history.
  commit: c0eb0397499044a0fc365a279d06d6bfe71ad646
bounty:
  amt: 
  url: 
  announced: 
lessons:
  yagni:
    note: 
    applies: 
  question: |
    Are there any common lessons we have learned from class that apply to this
    vulnerability? In other words, could this vulnerability serve as an example
    of one of those lessons?

    Leave "applies" blank or put false if you did not see that lesson (you do
    not need to put a reason). Put "true" if you feel the lesson applies and put
    a quick explanation of how it applies.

    Don't feel the need to claim that ALL of these apply, but it's pretty likely
    that one or two of them apply.

    If you think of another lesson we covered in class that applies here, feel
    free to give it a small name and add one in the same format as these.
  serial_killer:
    note: 
    applies: 
  complex_inputs:
    note: 
    applies: 
  distrust_input:
    note: 
    applies: 
  least_privilege:
    note: 
    applies: 
  native_wrappers:
    note: 
    applies: 
  defense_in_depth:
    note: 
    applies: 
  defensive_coding:
    note: This issue where memory would be freed but referenced again afterwards illustrates
      dangers with not using free correctly. Particularly, once you free a location
      other things can immediately start using it, so don't reference it or free it
      again.
    applies: true
  secure_by_default:
    note: 
    applies: 
  environment_variables:
    note: 
    applies: 
  security_by_obscurity:
    note: 
    applies: 
  frameworks_are_optional:
    note: 
    applies: 
reviews: []
upvotes: 4
CWE_note: 
mistakes:
  answer: "It seems that when they began using the APR memory pool they made\nan incorrect
    assumption about how long their data would remain in its\ntable. While automated
    testing may have eventually caught it, it's\nunderstandable that a few manual
    tests might have missed this (as nothing\nappears to be wrong if you get lucky
    and nothing else takes up the freed\nlocation in memory). Better understanding
    their tools and using automated\ntests could have helped catch or prevent this.
    CWE-825 lists mitigations\nthat wouldn't be useful in the situation: use a language
    that manages \nmemory automatically and set pointers to null after freeing. They\nweren't
    in a position to stop using C code and, as the CWE site points \nout, complex
    data structures (like the new APR memory pool) reduces the\neffectiveness of setting
    pointers to null.\n"
  question: |
    In your opinion, after all of this research, what mistakes were made that
    led to this vulnerability? Coding mistakes? Design mistakes?
    Maintainability? Requirements? Miscommunications?

    Look at the CWE entry for this vulnerability and examine the mitigations
    they have written there. Are they doing those? Does the fix look proper?

    Use those questions to inspire your answer. Don't feel obligated to answer
    every one. Write a thoughtful entry here that those ing the software
    engineering industry would find interesting.
nickname: 
reported: 
announced: 2007-06-04T23:30Z
published: 
subsystem:
  name: cache
  answer: The file that was fixed was mod_mem_cache, located under the modules/cache
    directory.
  question: |
    What subsystems was the mistake in?

    Look at the path of the source code files code that were fixed to get
    directory names. Look at comments in the code. Look at the bug reports how
    the bug report was tagged.
discovered:
  date: '2007-02-06'
  answer: This was discovered by Xuekun Hu while he was using mod_mem_cache in Apache
    2.2.4. He simply noticed the data was incorrect.
  apache: false
  contest: false
  question: |
    How was this vulnerability discovered?

    Go to the bug report and read the conversation to find out how this was
    originally found. Answer in longform below in "answer", fill in the date in
    YYYY-MM-DD, and then determine if the vulnerability was found by a Apache
    employee (you can tell from their email address). If it's clear that the
    vulenrability was discovered by a contest, fill in the name there.

    The "automated" flag can be true, false, or nil.
    The "apache" flag can be true, false, or nil.
    The "contest" flag can be true, false, or nil.

    If there is no evidence as to how this vulnerability was found, then you may
    leave this part blank.
  automated: false
description: When using HTTP for communication, headers are included that contain
  information about the data being sent. Due to changes in memory allocation, when
  Apache would copy header data for a response header it sometimes tried to copy from
  a location in memory that had already been cleared. New data could have been put
  in the old location, and this data could be sensitive. This would result in any
  data a user is entering or viewing potentially getting leaked to the header, which
  would not necessarily be secure.
unit_tested:
  fix: false
  code: false
  answer: There does not appear to be automated unit tests for mod_mem_cache.c, and
    none were added in the fixing commit.
  question: |
    Were automated unit tests involved in this vulnerability?
    Was the original code unit tested, or not unit tested? Did the fix involve
    improving the automated tests?

    For the "code" answer below, look not only at the fix but the surrounding
    code near the fix and determine if and was there were unit tests involved
    for this module.

    For the "fix" answer below, check if the fix for the vulnerability involves
    adding or improving an automated test to ensure this doesn't happen again.
specification:
  answer: 
  answer_note: 
  instructions: |
    Is there mention of a violation of a specification? For example,
    an RFC specification, a protocol specification, or a requirements
    specification.

    Be sure to check all artifacts for this: bug report, security
    advisory, commit message, etc.

    The answer field should be boolean. In answer_note, please explain
    why you come to that conclusion.
curation_level: 1
CWE_instructions: |
  Please go to cwe.mitre.org and find the most specific, appropriate CWE entry
  that describes your vulnerability. (Tip: this may not be a good one to start
  with - spend time understanding this vulnerability before making your choice!)
autodiscoverable:
  answer: 
  answer_note: 
  instructions: |
    Is it plausible that a fully automated tool could have discovered
    this? These are tools that require little knowledge of the domain,
     e.g. automatic static analysis, compiler warnings, fuzzers.

    Examples for true answers: SQL injection, XSS, buffer overflow

    Examples for false: RFC violations, permissions issues, anything
    that requires the tool to be "aware" of the project's
    domain-specific requirements.

    The answer field should be boolean. In answer_note, please explain
    why you come to that conclusion.
yaml_instructions: 
bounty_instructions: |
  If you came across any indications that a bounty was paid out for this
  vulnerability, fill it out here. Or correct it if the information already here
  was wrong. Otherwise, leave it blank.
interesting_commits:
  commits:
  - note: |-
      A rather large revert commit took place in between the VCC and fix. It had a comical commit message and undid several other commits. The revert didn't revert the VCC, but it may be indicative of development hitting a significant wall while working in the cache module.

      Formerly 690361fe768aa528206eaf6e29f28ca5127c6b01 before HTTPD rewrote Git history.
    commit: a9f530e3171ddecbb7f425c228a10c46c93bd8a1
  - note: 
    commit: 
  question: |
    Are there any interesting commits between your VCC(s) and fix(es)?

    Write a brief (under 100 words) description of why you think this commit was
    interesting in light of the lessons learned from this vulnerability. Any
    emerging themes?
curated_instructions: |
  If you are manually editing this file, then you are "curating" it. Set the
  entry below to "true" as soon as you start. This will enable additional
  integrity checks on this file to make sure you fill everything out properly.
  If you are a student, we cannot accept your work as finished unless curated is
  set to true.
upvotes_instructions: |
  For the first round, ignore this upvotes number.

  For the second round of reviewing, you will be giving a certain amount of
  upvotes to each vulnerability you see. Your peers will tell you how
  interesting they think this vulnerability is, and you'll add that to the
  upvotes score on your branch.
nickname_instructions: |
  A catchy name for this vulnerability that would draw attention it. If the
  report mentions a nickname, use that. Must be under 30 characters.
  Optional.
reported_instructions: 
announced_instructions: |
  Was there a date that this vulnerability was announced to the world? You can
  find this in changelogs, blogs, bug reports, or perhaps the CVE date. A good
  source for this is Chrome's Stable Release Channel
  (https://chromereleases.googleblog.com/).
  Please enter your date in YYYY-MM-DD format.
fixes_vcc_instructions: |
  Please put the commit hash in "commit" below (see my example in
  CVE-2011-3092.yml). Fixes and VCCs follow the same format.
published_instructions: 
description_instructions: |
  You can get an initial description from the CVE entry on cve.mitre.org. These
  descriptions are a fine start, but they can be kind of jargony.

  Rewrite this description in your own words. Make it interesting and easy to
  read to anyone with some programming experience. We can always pull up the NVD
  description later to get more technical.

  Try to still be specific in your description, but remove Chromium-specific
  stuff. Remove references to versions, specific filenames, and other jargon
  that outsiders to Chromium would not understand. Technology like "regular
  expressions" is fine, and security phrases like "invalid write" are fine to
  keep too.