| Name |
Path Traversal |
|
| Likelyhood of attack |
Typical severity |
| High |
Very High |
|
| Summary |
An adversary uses path manipulation methods to exploit insufficient input validation of a target to obtain access to data that should be not be retrievable by ordinary well-formed requests. A typical variety of this attack involves specifying a path to a desired file together with dot-dot-slash characters, resulting in the file access API or function traversing out of the intended directory structure and into the root file system. By replacing or modifying the expected path information the access function or API retrieves the file desired by the attacker. These attacks either involve the attacker providing a complete path to a targeted file or using control characters (e.g. path separators (/ or \) and/or dots (.)) to reach desired directories or files. |
| Prerequisites |
The attacker must be able to control the path that is requested of the target. The target must fail to adequately sanitize incoming paths |
| Solutions | Design: Configure the access control correctly. Design: Enforce principle of least privilege. Design: Execute programs with constrained privileges, so parent process does not open up further vulnerabilities. Ensure that all directories, temporary directories and files, and memory are executing with limited privileges to protect against remote execution. Design: Input validation. Assume that user inputs are malicious. Utilize strict type, character, and encoding enforcement. Design: Proxy communication to host, so that communications are terminated at the proxy, sanitizing the requests before forwarding to server host. Design: Run server interfaces with a non-root account and/or utilize chroot jails or other configuration techniques to constrain privileges even if attacker gains some limited access to commands. Implementation: Host integrity monitoring for critical files, directories, and processes. The goal of host integrity monitoring is to be aware when a security issue has occurred so that incident response and other forensic activities can begin. Implementation: Perform input validation for all remote content, including remote and user-generated content. Implementation: Perform testing such as pen-testing and vulnerability scanning to identify directories, programs, and interfaces that grant direct access to executables. Implementation: Use indirect references rather than actual file names. Implementation: Use possible permissions on file access when developing and deploying web applications. Implementation: Validate user input by only accepting known good. Ensure all content that is delivered to client is sanitized against an acceptable content specification -- using an allowlist approach. |
| Related Weaknesses |
|
CWE ID
|
Description
|
| CWE-22 |
Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory ('Path Traversal') |
|
| Related CAPECS |
|
CAPEC ID
|
Description
|
| CAPEC-153 |
An attacker exploits a weakness in input validation by controlling the format, structure, and composition of data to an input-processing interface. By supplying input of a non-standard or unexpected form an attacker can adversely impact the security of the target. For example, using a different character encoding might cause dangerous text to be treated as safe text. Alternatively, the attacker may use certain flags, such as file extensions, to make a target application believe that provided data should be handled using a certain interpreter when the data is not actually of the appropriate type. This can lead to bypassing protection mechanisms, forcing the target to use specific components for input processing, or otherwise causing the user's data to be handled differently than might otherwise be expected. This attack differs from Variable Manipulation in that Variable Manipulation attempts to subvert the target's processing through the value of the input while Input Data Manipulation seeks to control how the input is processed. |
|
| Taxonomy: WASC |
|
Entry ID
|
Entry Name
|
| 33 |
Path Traversal |
|
| Taxonomy: OWASP Attacks |
|
Entry ID
|
Entry Name
|
| Link |
Path Traversal |
|