Weakness · High

CWE-116: Improper Encoding or Escaping of Output

What it is

The product prepares a structured message for communication with another component, but encoding or escaping of the data is either missing or done incorrectly. As a result, the intended structure of the message is not preserved.

Likelihood of exploit: High4 exploited in the wildMITRE CWE 4.19.1

Severity (our rating): High
Likelihood of exploit: High
Introduced during: Implementation, Operation
Exploited in the wild: 4 known exploited CVEs

In more detail

Improper encoding or escaping can allow attackers to change the commands that are sent to another component, inserting malicious commands instead. Most products follow a certain protocol that uses structured messages for communication between components, such as queries or commands. These structured messages can contain raw data interspersed with metadata or control information. For example, "GET /index.html HTTP/1.1" is a structured message containing a command ("GET") with a single argument ("/index.html") and metadata about which protocol version is being used ("HTTP/1.1"). If an application uses attacker-supplied inputs to construct a structured message without properly encoding or escaping, then the attacker could insert special characters that will cause the data to be interpreted as control information or metadata. Consequently, the component that receives the output will perform the wrong operations, or otherwise interpret the data incorrectly.

What an attacker can do

Modify Application Data (Integrity)
Execute Unauthorized Code or Commands (Integrity, Confidentiality, Availability, Access Control)
Bypass Protection Mechanism (Confidentiality)

How to prevent it

Architecture and Design

Use a vetted library or framework that does not allow this weakness to occur or provides constructs that make this weakness easier to avoid. For example, consider using the ESAPI Encoding control or a similar tool, library, or framework. These will help the programmer encode outputs in a manner less prone to error. Alternately, use built-in functions, but consider using wrappers in case those functions are discovered to have a vulnerability.
If available, use structured mechanisms that automatically enforce the separation between data and code. These mechanisms may be able to provide the relevant quoting, encoding, and validation automatically, instead of relying on the developer to provide this capability at every point where output is generated. For example, stored procedures can enforce database query structure and reduce the likelihood of SQL injection.
Understand the context in which your data will be used and the encoding that will be expected. This is especially important when transmitting data between different components, or when generating outputs that can contain multiple encodings at the same time, such as web pages or multi-part mail messages. Study all expected communication protocols and data representations to determine the required encoding strategies.
In some cases, input validation may be an important strategy when output encoding is not a complete solution. For example, you may be providing the same output that will be processed by multiple consumers that use different encodings or representations. In other cases, you may be required to allow user-supplied input to contain control information, such as limited HTML tags that support formatting in a wiki or bulletin board. When this type of requirement must be met, use an extremely strict allowlist to limit which control sequences can be used. Verify that the resulting syntactic structure is what you expect. Use your normal encoding methods for the remainder of the input.
Use input validation as a defense-in-depth measure to reduce the likelihood of output encoding errors (see CWE-20).

Requirements

Fully specify which encodings are required by components that will be communicating with each other.

Implementation

When exchanging data between components, ensure that both components are using the same character encoding. Ensure that the proper encoding is applied at each interface. Explicitly set the encoding you are using whenever the protocol allows you to do so.

How to find it

Automated Static Analysis. This weakness can often be detected using automated static analysis tools. Many modern tools use data flow analysis or constraint-based techniques to minimize the number of false positives.
Automated Dynamic Analysis. This weakness can be detected using dynamic tools and techniques that interact with the software using large test suites with many diverse inputs, such as fuzz testing (fuzzing), robustness testing, and fault injection. The software's operation may slow down, but it should not become unstable, crash, or generate incorrect results.

CWE-116 on MITRE's CWE site

Exploited in the wild: 4 CVEs

Vulnerabilities caused by CWE-116 that attackers have used, from CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog, newest first.

All known exploited vulnerabilities

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Source: MITRE Common Weakness Enumeration, CWE version 4.19.1. CWE is a trademark of The MITRE Corporation.