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Netty CVE-2021-21295

MEDIUM
HTTP Request/Response Smuggling (CWE-444)
2021-03-09 security-advisories@github.com
5.9
CVSS 3.1 · NVD
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Severity by source

NVD PRIMARY
5.9 MEDIUM
AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N

Primary rating from NVD · only source for this CVE.

CVSS VectorNVD

Attack Vector
Network
Attack Complexity
High
Privileges Required
None
User Interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
High
Availability
None

Lifecycle Timeline

1
CVE Published
Mar 09, 2021 - 19:15 nvd
MEDIUM 5.9

DescriptionNVD

Netty is an open-source, asynchronous event-driven network application framework for rapid development of maintainable high performance protocol servers & clients. In Netty (io.netty:netty-codec-http2) before version 4.1.60.Final there is a vulnerability that enables request smuggling. If a Content-Length header is present in the original HTTP/2 request, the field is not validated by Http2MultiplexHandler as it is propagated up. This is fine as long as the request is not proxied through as HTTP/1.1. If the request comes in as an HTTP/2 stream, gets converted into the HTTP/1.1 domain objects (HttpRequest, HttpContent, etc.) via Http2StreamFrameToHttpObjectCodec and then sent up to the child channel's pipeline and proxied through a remote peer as HTTP/1.1 this may result in request smuggling. In a proxy case, users may assume the content-length is validated somehow, which is not the case. If the request is forwarded to a backend channel that is a HTTP/1.1 connection, the Content-Length now has meaning and needs to be checked. An attacker can smuggle requests inside the body as it gets downgraded from HTTP/2 to HTTP/1.1. For an example attack refer to the linked GitHub Advisory. Users are only affected if all of this is true: HTTP2MultiplexCodec or Http2FrameCodec is used, Http2StreamFrameToHttpObjectCodec is used to convert to HTTP/1.1 objects, and these HTTP/1.1 objects are forwarded to another remote peer. This has been patched in 4.1.60.Final As a workaround, the user can do the validation by themselves by implementing a custom ChannelInboundHandler that is put in the ChannelPipeline behind Http2StreamFrameToHttpObjectCodec.

AnalysisAI

Netty is an open-source, asynchronous event-driven network application framework for rapid development of maintainable high performance protocol servers & clients. Rated medium severity (CVSS 5.9), this vulnerability is remotely exploitable, no authentication required. This HTTP Request/Response Smuggling vulnerability could allow attackers to manipulate HTTP request interpretation between frontend and backend servers.

Technical ContextAI

This vulnerability is classified as HTTP Request/Response Smuggling (CWE-444), which allows attackers to manipulate HTTP request interpretation between frontend and backend servers. Netty is an open-source, asynchronous event-driven network application framework for rapid development of maintainable high performance protocol servers & clients. In Netty (io.netty:netty-codec-http2) before version 4.1.60.Final there is a vulnerability that enables request smuggling. If a Content-Length header is present in the original HTTP/2 request, the field is not validated by Http2MultiplexHandler as it is propagated up. This is fine as long as the request is not proxied through as HTTP/1.1. If the request comes in as an HTTP/2 stream, gets converted into the HTTP/1.1 domain objects (HttpRequest, HttpContent, etc.) via Http2StreamFrameToHttpObjectCodec and then sent up to the child channel's pipeline and proxied through a remote peer as HTTP/1.1 this may result in request smuggling. In a proxy case, users may assume the content-length is validated somehow, which is not the case. If the request is forwarded to a backend channel that is a HTTP/1.1 connection, the Content-Length now has meaning and needs to be checked. An attacker can smuggle requests inside the body as it gets downgraded from HTTP/2 to HTTP/1.1. For an example attack refer to the linked GitHub Advisory. Users are only affected if all of this is true: HTTP2MultiplexCodec or Http2FrameCodec is used, Http2StreamFrameToHttpObjectCodec is used to convert to HTTP/1.1 objects, and these HTTP/1.1 objects are forwarded to another remote peer. This has been patched in 4.1.60.Final As a workaround, the user can do the validation by themselves by implementing a custom ChannelInboundHandler that is put in the ChannelPipeline behind Http2StreamFrameToHttpObjectCodec. Affected products include: Netty, Netapp Oncommand Api Services, Netapp Oncommand Workflow Automation, Debian Debian Linux, Quarkus. Version information: version 4.1.60..

RemediationAI

A vendor patch is available. Apply the latest security update as soon as possible. Enforce strict HTTP parsing, normalize requests at proxy layer, use HTTP/2 end-to-end, reject ambiguous headers.

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CVE-2021-21295 vulnerability details – vuln.today

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