CVE-2023-36479

Eclipse Jetty Canonical Repository is the canonical repository for the Jetty project. Users of the CgiServlet with a very specific command structure may have the wrong command executed. If a user sends a request to a org.eclipse.jetty.servlets.CGI Servlet for a binary with a space in its name, the servlet will escape the command by wrapping it in quotation marks. This wrapped command, plus an optional command prefix, will then be executed through a call to Runtime.exec. If the original binary name provided by the user contains a quotation mark followed by a space, the resulting command line will contain multiple tokens instead of one. This issue was patched in version 9.4.52, 10.0.16, 11.0.16 and 12.0.0-beta2.

Weakness

Quotes injected into a product can be used to compromise a system. As data are parsed, an injected/absent/duplicate/malformed use of quotes may cause the process to take unexpected actions.

Affected Software

Potential Mitigations

• Assume all input is malicious. Use an “accept known good” input validation strategy, i.e., use a list of acceptable inputs that strictly conform to specifications. Reject any input that does not strictly conform to specifications, or transform it into something that does.
• When performing input validation, consider all potentially relevant properties, including length, type of input, the full range of acceptable values, missing or extra inputs, syntax, consistency across related fields, and conformance to business rules. As an example of business rule logic, “boat” may be syntactically valid because it only contains alphanumeric characters, but it is not valid if the input is only expected to contain colors such as “red” or “blue.”
• Do not rely exclusively on looking for malicious or malformed inputs. This is likely to miss at least one undesirable input, especially if the code’s environment changes. This can give attackers enough room to bypass the intended validation. However, denylists can be useful for detecting potential attacks or determining which inputs are so malformed that they should be rejected outright.

Related Attack Patterns

• https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/468.html

References

• https://github.com/eclipse/jetty.project/pull/9516
• https://github.com/eclipse/jetty.project/pull/9888
• https://github.com/eclipse/jetty.project/pull/9889
• https://github.com/eclipse/jetty.project/security/advisories/GHSA-3gh6-v5v9-6v9j
• https://lists.debian.org/debian-lts-announce/2023/09/msg00039.html
• https://www.debian.org/security/2023/dsa-5507