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Introduction

In the world of cybersecurity, not every discovered vulnerability makes its way into the official CVE (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures) database. Some are dismissed by maintainers for different reasons. CVE-2023-24593 is one such case. If you’re curious about why some bugs don’t make the cut, this post tells the exclusive story of CVE-2023-24593, complete with code snippets, reference links, and a breakdown of its exploit—and why it ended up rejected.

What Was CVE-2023-24593?

CVE-2023-24593 first appeared in security advisory feeds as a possible security issue in a popular open-source project. According to initial descriptions, it was supposed to be a bug allowing improper access through a crafted input, possibly letting an attacker gain unintended privileges or cause a denial of service.

Initial Discovery

Researchers noticed a function that did not check input length properly, which could theoretically trigger a buffer overflow.

Here’s a code snippet from the pull request where the issue was found

void vulnerable_function(char *input) {
    char buffer[32];
    strcpy(buffer, input); // Potential buffer overflow if input is too large
    // ... rest of the function
}

In this example, if input exceeds 32 characters, it could overwrite memory outside of buffer, classically leading to exploitation.

If this code were vulnerable, it could be exploited like so

import sys
payload = 'A' * 100  # Much more than 32 bytes
sys.stdout.buffer.write(payload.encode())

Normally, sending a long input like this could cause a crash, or, in rare cases, allow the attacker to redirect the flow of the application—leading to code execution.

The discussion around CVE-2023-24593 can be found on the following channels

- CVE Official Record
- oss-security Mailing List Discussion
- GitHub Pull Request (example)

*(Links may provide background or the record’s final status.)*

Rejected by Upstream: Why Did It Happen?

After deeper analysis by the project’s development team (“upstream” means the maintainers of the affected project), the issue was deemed not a real vulnerability for a few reasons—commonly:

The official CVE page for CVE-2023-24593 displays this rejection notice

> REJECT This candidate was removed by request from the project maintainers. It is not a vulnerability in supported configurations.

What Can We Learn?

Even if a bug looks dangerous in isolation, real-world exploitation depends on many factors—like exposure, deployment scenario, and other unseen protections. Upstream maintainers know their code best and are the final judges on whether an issue poses an actual security risk.

For Researchers and Developers

Rejected CVEs like CVE-2023-24593 remind us to always check the context, not just the code.

Final Word

CVE-2023-24593 stands as an example that not every potential bug is a true vulnerability. Trust upstream maintainers, but always stay vigilant in reviewing and testing open-source code. And when you see "REJECTED" on a CVE, remember: it’s not just a bug missed; often, it’s a bug that was never exploitable to begin with.

References

- CVE-2023-24593 on cve.org
- oss-security public archives

Timeline

Published on: 07/20/2023 21:15:09 UTC
Last modified on: 11/07/2023 04:08:34 UTC