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xkeys seal encryption used fixed key for all encryption

High severity GitHub Reviewed Published Oct 29, 2023 in nats-io/nkeys • Updated Dec 7, 2023

Package

gomod github.com/nats-io/nats-server/v2 (Go)

Affected versions

>= 2.10.0, <= 2.10.3

Patched versions

2.10.4
gomod github.com/nats-io/nkeys (Go)
>= 0.4.0, <= 0.4.5
0.4.6

Description

Background

NATS.io is a high performance open source pub-sub distributed communication technology, built for the cloud, on-premise, IoT, and edge computing.

The cryptographic key handling library, nkeys, recently gained support for encryption, not just for signing/authentication. This is used in nats-server 2.10 (Sep 2023) and newer for authentication callouts.

Problem Description

The nkeys library's "xkeys" encryption handling logic mistakenly passed an array by value into an internal function, where the function mutated that buffer to populate the encryption key to use. As a result, all encryption was actually to an all-zeros key.

This affects encryption only, not signing.
FIXME: FILL IN IMPACT ON NATS-SERVER AUTH CALLOUT SECURITY.

Affected versions

nkeys Go library:

  • 0.4.0 up to and including 0.4.5
  • Fixed with nats-io/nkeys: 0.4.6

NATS Server:

  • 2.10.0 up to and including 2.10.3
  • Fixed with nats-io/nats-server: 2.10.4

Solution

Upgrade the nats-server.
For any application handling auth callouts in Go, if using the nkeys library, update the dependency, recompile and deploy that in lockstep.

Credits

Problem reported by Quentin Matillat (GitHub @tinou98).

References

@philpennock philpennock published to nats-io/nkeys Oct 29, 2023
Published by the National Vulnerability Database Oct 31, 2023
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Oct 31, 2023
Reviewed Oct 31, 2023
Last updated Dec 7, 2023

Severity

High

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Network
Attack complexity
Low
Privileges required
None
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
None
Availability
None

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N

EPSS score

0.073%
(33rd percentile)

Weaknesses

CVE ID

CVE-2023-46129

GHSA ID

GHSA-mr45-rx8q-wcm9

Source code

Credits

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