CVE-2016-1616

CVE: CVE-2016-1616
CWE:
- 345
- 254
bugs:
- 541415
repo: 
vccs:
- note: |
    First commit with custom_button.cc, where the bug was located. This is the vcc by
    default since the bug had always been present until it was fixed, and this is the
    commit where the offending file was added.
  commit: 48977d584e9516d70222e5c9b62c01e3516b5283
fixes:
- note: ''
  commit: 297ae873b471a46929ea39697b121c0b411434ee
bounty:
  date: '2016-01-20 18:12:00.000000000 -05:00'
  amount: 500.0
  references:
  - http://chromereleases.googleblog.com/2016/01/stable-channel-update_20.html
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: |
      This vulnerability concerns an edge case that was not discovered until years
      after release, so it's safe to say that the input required from a user to exploit
      this vulnerability is complex.
    applies: true
  distrust_input:
    note: |
      This exploit works by taking input from the user through an unfocused custom button,
      so this vulnerability could have been mitigated by being more distrustful with how
      a user could interact with the button and putting in more checks.
    applies: true
  least_privilege:
    note: 
    applies: 
  native_wrappers:
    note: 
    applies: 
  defense_in_depth:
    note: 
    applies: 
  secure_by_default:
    note: 
    applies: 
  environment_variables:
    note: 
    applies: 
  security_by_obscurity:
    note: 
    applies: 
  frameworks_are_optional:
    note: 
    applies: 
reviews:
- 1576073002
- 1437523005
- 1424753003
upvotes: 
mistakes:
  answer: |
    This bug is the result of a mistake during planning given that a test case that
    could have caught the issue was never considered until a vulnerability was discovered.
    The lesson to be taken from this is that determining obscure edge cases can
    help determine potentially dangerous vulnerabilities. Oversights are inevitable,
    so bounty programs a good way to get as many eyes on your code as possible. If
    this vulnerability wasn't reported by a community member, it could have languished
    in the source code for years to come.
  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.
announced: '2016-01-25 06:59:04.773000000 -05:00'
subsystem:
  name: Custom button
  answer: |
    Based on the description in the CVE and the source code. The bug was only present with
    custom buttons, so that is the subsystem where the issue resided.
  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. Examples: "clipboard", "gpu", "ssl", "speech", "renderer"
discovered:
  date: '2015-10-9'
  answer: Community member Luan Herrera found the bug and reported it.
  google: 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 Google
    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 "google" flag can be true, false, or nil.

    If there is no evidence as to how this vulnerability was found, then you may
    leave the entries blank except for "answer". Write down where you looked in "answer".
  automated: false
description: |
  There was a vulnerability where an attacker could spoof a URL using an unfocused
  button in the UI via an accelerator, or keyboard shortcut. An unfocused button is a
  button that does not currently have the focus of the web browser. Only one button
  can be focused at a time and hitting enter essentially clicks the currently focused
  button. A button can become focused after it is clicked or if it is selected through
  pressing tab. The issue is that when unfocused buttons are allowed to interact with
  accelerators, or keyboard shortcuts, a malicious actor could force a user to navigate
  to an arbitrary website.
unit_tested:
  fix: true
  code: false
  answer: The fix was tested and they added a test in the commit that fixed the bug
  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.
major_events:
  answer: |
    There were no major events, this vulnerability was a part of chromium since
    custom_button.cc was created and was fixed soon after it was discovered.
  events:
  - date: 
    name: 
  - date: 
    name: 
  question: |
    Please record any major events you found in the history of this
    vulnerability. Was the code rewritten at some point? Was a nearby subsystem
    changed? Did the team change?

    The event doesn't need to be directly related to this vulnerability, rather,
    we want to capture what the development team was dealing with at the time.
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!)
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:
  answer: 
  commits:
  - note: |
      In this commit, they changed how accelerators are handled. The bug dealt with how
      custom buttons interact with accelerators, so they could have caught the bug years
      earlier if they were looking for vulnerabilities when they made this change.
    commit: f4856f1766103bcdf8b2625a4cf606b710bae9c2
  - 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?

    If there are no interesting commits, demonstrate that you completed this section by explaining what happened between the VCCs and the fix.
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.
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.
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.