Weakness · Medium

CWE-664: Improper Control of a Resource Through its Lifetime

What it is

The product does not maintain or incorrectly maintains control over a resource throughout its lifetime of creation, use, and release.

1 exploited in the wildMITRE CWE 4.19.1

Severity (our rating)
Medium
Likelihood of exploit
Not rated by MITRE
Introduced during
Implementation
Exploited in the wild
1 known exploited CVE

In more detail

Resources often have explicit instructions on how to be created, used and destroyed. When code does not follow these instructions, it can lead to unexpected behaviors and potentially exploitable states. Even without explicit instructions, various principles are expected to be adhered to, such as "Do not use an object until after its creation is complete," or "do not use an object after it has been slated for destruction."

What an attacker can do

  • Other (Other)

How to prevent it

MITRE lists no specific mitigation for this weakness. Treat it like its parent weaknesses below: validate input, keep the design simple and review the code where it could appear.

How to find it

  • Automated Static Analysis. Use Static analysis tools to check for unreleased resources.

CWE-664 on MITRE's CWE site

Exploited in the wild: 1 CVE

Vulnerabilities caused by CWE-664 that attackers have used, from CISA's Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog, newest first.

All known exploited vulnerabilities

H2 Security

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