A recent vulnerability, CVE-2023-25585, was discovered in Binutils, a collection of binary tools used for manipulating object files that store data and code. The flaw stems from the use of an uninitialized field in the struct module *module, potentially causing applications to crash and leading to a local denial of service (DoS) attack. This post will provide a detailed analysis of the vulnerability, including code snippets, references to original resources, and exploit details.

Background

Binutils is a widely utilized set of tools for working with object files on Unix-based systems. It includes popular utilities such as objdump, nm, and readelf, which are frequently used by developers and security researchers to analyze binary files.

The Vulnerability

The vulnerability in question, CVE-2023-25585, affects the way Binutils handles memory allocation for a struct module *module object. Specifically, a certain uninitialized field in this struct may lead to unpredictable behavior and crashes, which could be exploited to cause a local DoS attack. The following code snippet demonstrates the issue:

struct module {
    ...
    int uninitialized_field;
    ...
};

void vulnerable_function() {
    struct module *module;
    ...
    if (module->uninitialized_field) {
        ...
    }
}

In the example above, the

uninitialized_field

is not properly initialized, and its value is left undefined. When Binutils tries to access this field, it may read arbitrary memory, leading to a crash or unexpected behavior.

Exploit Details

To exploit this vulnerability, a potential attacker would need to craft a malicious object file that triggers a certain code path in Binutils, specifically causing the uninitialized field to be checked within the vulnerable_function(). This would likely lead to a crash in the affected program, resulting in a local DoS.

Mitigation and Patch

To mitigate this vulnerability, ensure that all fields within the struct module *module declaration are properly initialized and have well-defined default values, as shown below:

struct module {
    ...
    int initialized_field;
    ...
};

void safe_function() {
    struct module *module;
    ...
    module->initialized_field = ; // Initialization
    ...
    if (module->initialized_field) {
        ...
    }
}

Software maintainers and developers using Binutils should update to the latest version of the software, which includes the necessary security patch.

Original References

1. The official CVE entry for the vulnerability can be found at https://cve.mitre.org/cgi-bin/cvename.cgi?name=CVE-2023-25585
2. The Binutils project website, where the latest version of the software and related resources can be found: https://www.gnu.org/software/binutils/

Conclusion

CVE-2023-25585 is a critical vulnerability affecting the popular Unix-based software Binutils. Due to the use of an uninitialized field in the struct module *module, applications may crash, leading to a local DoS. Developers and users are encouraged to update their software to the latest version, which mitigates the vulnerability.

Timeline

Published on: 09/14/2023 21:15:00 UTC
Last modified on: 09/20/2023 17:35:00 UTC