Rack is a modular Ruby web server interface. Prior to versions 2.2.23, 3.1.21, and 3.2.6, Rack::Multipart::Parser only wraps the request body in a BoundedIO when CONTENT_LENGTH is present. When a multipart/form-data request is sent without a Content-Length header, such as with HTTP chunked transfer encoding, multipart parsing continues until end-of-stream with no total size limit. For file parts, the uploaded body is written directly to a temporary file on disk rather than being constrained by the buffered in-memory upload limit. An unauthenticated attacker can therefore stream an arbitrarily large multipart file upload and consume unbounded disk space. This results in a denial of service condition for Rack applications that accept multipart form data. This issue has been patched in versions 2.2.23, 3.1.21, and 3.2.6.
The product does not properly control the allocation and maintenance of a limited resource.
| Name | Vendor | Start Version | End Version |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rack | Rack | * | 2.2.23 (excluding) |
| Rack | Rack | 3.0.0 (including) | 3.1.21 (excluding) |
| Rack | Rack | 3.2.0 (including) | 3.2.6 (excluding) |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | devel | * |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | esm-apps-legacy/xenial | * |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | esm-apps/bionic | * |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | esm-apps/focal | * |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | esm-apps/jammy | * |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | esm-apps/xenial | * |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | esm-infra-legacy/trusty | * |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | jammy | * |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | noble | * |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | questing | * |
| Ruby-rack | Ubuntu | resolute | * |
Mitigation of resource exhaustion attacks requires that the target system either:
The first of these solutions is an issue in itself though, since it may allow attackers to prevent the use of the system by a particular valid user. If the attacker impersonates the valid user, they may be able to prevent the user from accessing the server in question.
The second solution is simply difficult to effectively institute – and even when properly done, it does not provide a full solution. It simply makes the attack require more resources on the part of the attacker.