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Weakness · High

CWE-583: finalize() Method Declared Public

What it is

The product violates secure coding principles for mobile code by declaring a finalize() method public.

MITRE CWE 4.19.1

Severity (our rating)
High
Likelihood of exploit
Not rated by MITRE
Introduced during
Implementation
Exploited in the wild
No CVE in CISA's catalog

In more detail

A product should never call finalize explicitly, except to call super.finalize() inside an implementation of finalize(). In mobile code situations, the otherwise error prone practice of manual garbage collection can become a security threat if an attacker can maliciously invoke a finalize() method because it is declared with public access.

What an attacker can do

  • Alter Execution Logic (Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability)
  • Execute Unauthorized Code or Commands (Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability)
  • Modify Application Data (Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability)

How to prevent it

Implementation

  • If you are using finalize() as it was designed, there is no reason to declare finalize() with anything other than protected access.

How to find it

  • Automated Static Analysis. Automated static analysis, commonly referred to as Static Application Security Testing (SAST), can find some instances of this weakness by analyzing source code (or binary/compiled code) without having to execute it. Typically, this is done by building a model of data flow and control flow, then searching for potentially-vulnerable patterns that connect "sources" (origins of input) with "sinks" (destinations where the data interacts with external components, a lower layer such as the OS, etc.)

CWE-583 on MITRE's CWE site

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