Improper Protection for Outbound Error Messages and Alert Signals

Opis

Untrusted agents can disable alerts about signal conditions exceeding limits or the response mechanism that handles such alerts.

Hardware sensors are used to detect whether a device is operating within design limits. The threshold values for these limits are set by hardware fuses or trusted software such as a BIOS. Modification of these limits may be protected by hardware mechanisms.

When device sensors detect out of bound conditions, alert signals may be generated for remedial action, which may take the form of device shutdown or throttling.

Warning signals that are not properly secured may be disabled or used to generate spurious alerts, causing degraded performance or denial-of-service (DoS). These alerts may be masked by untrusted software. Examples of these alerts involve thermal and power sensor alerts.

Skutki

• Availability

  DoS: Instability; DoS: Crash, Exit, or Restart; Reduce Reliability; Unexpected State

Zapobieganie

• Architecture and Design

  Alert signals generated by critical events should be protected from access by untrusted agents. Only hardware or trusted firmware modules should be able to alter the alert configuration.

Słabość nadrzędna

• CWE-284 Improper Access Control

Kiedy powstaje

• Architecture and Design
• Implementation

Dotyczy

Not Language-Specific, Not OS-Specific, Not Architecture-Specific, System on Chip, Microcontroller Hardware, Memory Hardware, Power Management Hardware, Processor Hardware, Test/Debug Hardware, Sensor Hardware