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Cached redirect poisoning via X-Forwarded-Host header

High severity GitHub Reviewed Published Jun 29, 2021 in ratpack/ratpack • Updated Feb 1, 2023

Package

maven io.ratpack:ratpack-core (Maven)

Affected versions

< 1.9.0

Patched versions

1.9.0

Description

A user supplied X-Forwarded-Host header can be used to perform cache poisoning of a cache fronting a Ratpack server if the cache key does not include the X-Forwarded-Host header as a cache key.

Users are only vulnerable if they do not configure a custom PublicAddress instance. A custom PublicAddress can be specified by using ServerConfigBuilder::publicAddress. For versions prior to 1.9.0, by default, Ratpack utilizes an inferring version of PublicAddress which is vulnerable.

Impact

This can be used to perform redirect cache poisoning where an attacker can force a cached redirect to redirect to their site instead of the intended redirect location.

Patches

As of Ratpack 1.9.0, two changes have been made that mitigate this vulnerability:

  1. The default PublicAddress implementation no longer infers the address from the request context, instead relying on the configured bind host/port
  2. Relative redirects issued by the application are no longer absolutized; they are passed through as-is

Workarounds

In production, ensure that ServerConfigBuilder::publicAddress correctly configures the server.

References

References

@ldaley ldaley published to ratpack/ratpack Jun 29, 2021
Published by the National Vulnerability Database Jun 29, 2021
Reviewed Jun 30, 2021
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Jul 1, 2021
Last updated Feb 1, 2023

Severity

High

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Network
Attack complexity
High
Privileges required
None
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
Low
Integrity
High
Availability
Low

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:L/I:H/A:L

EPSS score

0.074%
(34th percentile)

Weaknesses

CVE ID

CVE-2021-29479

GHSA ID

GHSA-w6rq-6h34-vh7q

Source code

Credits

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