Libcurl vulnerabilities

When doing a second SMB request to the same host again, curl would wrongly use a data pointer pointing into already freed memory.

URLs containing percent-encoded slashes (`/` or `\`) can trick wcurl into saving the output file outside of the current directory without the user explicitly asking for it. This flaw only affects the wcurl command line tool.

When doing SSH-based transfers using either SCP or SFTP, and asked to do public key authentication, curl would wrongly still ask and authenticate using a locally running SSH agent.

When using `CURLOPT_PINNEDPUBLICKEY` option with libcurl or `--pinnedpubkey` with the curl tool,curl should check the public key of the server certificate to verify the peer. This check was skipped in a certain condition that would then make curl allow the connection without performing the proper check, thus not noticing a possible impostor. To skip this check, the connection had to be done with QUIC with ngtcp2 built to use GnuTLS and the user had to explicitly disable the standard certificate verification.

When doing multi-threaded LDAPS transfers (LDAP over TLS) with libcurl, changing TLS options in one thread would inadvertently change them globally and therefore possibly also affect other concurrently setup transfers. Disabling certificate verification for a specific transfer could unintentionally disable the feature for other threads as well.

Due to a mistake in libcurl's WebSocket code, a malicious server can send a particularly crafted packet which makes libcurl get trapped in an endless busy-loop. There is no other way for the application to escape or exit this loop other than killing the thread/process. This might be used to DoS libcurl-using application.

libcurl supports *pinning* of the server certificate public key for HTTPS transfers. Due to an omission, this check is not performed when connecting with QUIC for HTTP/3, when the TLS backend is wolfSSL. Documentation says the option works with wolfSSL, failing to specify that it does not for QUIC and HTTP/3. Since pinning makes the transfer succeed if the pin is fine, users could unwittingly connect to an impostor server without noticing.

libcurl accidentally skips the certificate verification for QUIC connections when connecting to a host specified as an IP address in the URL. Therefore, it does not detect impostors or man-in-the-middle attacks.

When libcurl is asked to perform automatic gzip decompression of content-encoded HTTP responses with the `CURLOPT_ACCEPT_ENCODING` option, **using zlib 1.2.0.3 or older**, an attacker-controlled integer overflow would make libcurl perform a buffer overflow.

libcurl would wrongly close the same eventfd file descriptor twice when taking down a connection channel after having completed a threaded name resolve.

When asked to use a `.netrc` file for credentials **and** to follow HTTP redirects, curl could leak the password used for the first host to the followed-to host under certain circumstances. This flaw only manifests itself if the netrc file has a `default` entry that omits both login and password. A rare circumstance.

When curl is told to use the Certificate Status Request TLS extension, often referred to as OCSP stapling, to verify that the server certificate is valid, it might fail to detect some OCSP problems and instead wrongly consider the response as fine. If the returned status reports another error than 'revoked' (like for example 'unauthorized') it is not treated as a bad certficate.

The libcurl CURLOPT_SSL_VERIFYPEER option was disabled on a subset of requests made by Nest production devices which enabled a potential man-in-the-middle attack on requests to Google cloud services by any host the traffic was routed through.

libcurl's ASN1 parser code has the `GTime2str()` function, used for parsing an ASN.1 Generalized Time field. If given an syntactically incorrect field, the parser might end up using -1 for the length of the *time fraction*, leading to a `strlen()` getting performed on a pointer to a heap buffer area that is not (purposely) null terminated. This flaw most likely leads to a crash, but can also lead to heap contents getting returned to the application when [CURLINFO_CERTINFO](https://curl.se/libcurl/c/CURLINFO_CERTINFO.html) is used.

libcurl's URL API function [curl_url_get()](https://curl.se/libcurl/c/curl_url_get.html) offers punycode conversions, to and from IDN. Asking to convert a name that is exactly 256 bytes, libcurl ends up reading outside of a stack based buffer when built to use the *macidn* IDN backend. The conversion function then fills up the provided buffer exactly - but does not null terminate the string. This flaw can lead to stack contents accidently getting returned as part of the converted string.

libcurl's ASN1 parser has this utf8asn1str() function used for parsing an ASN.1 UTF-8 string. Itcan detect an invalid field and return error. Unfortunately, when doing so it also invokes `free()` on a 4 byte localstack buffer. Most modern malloc implementations detect this error and immediately abort. Some however accept the input pointer and add that memory to its list of available chunks. This leads to the overwriting of nearby stack memory. The content of the overwrite is decided by the `free()` implementation; likely to be memory pointers and a set of flags. The most likely outcome of exploting this flaw is a crash, although it cannot be ruled out that more serious results can be had in special circumstances.

libcurl did not check the server certificate of TLS connections done to a host specified as an IP address, when built to use mbedTLS. libcurl would wrongly avoid using the set hostname function when the specified hostname was given as an IP address, therefore completely skipping the certificate check. This affects all uses of TLS protocols (HTTPS, FTPS, IMAPS, POPS3, SMTPS, etc).

When an application tells libcurl it wants to allow HTTP/2 server push, and the amount of received headers for the push surpasses the maximum allowed limit (1000), libcurl aborts the server push. When aborting, libcurl inadvertently does not free all the previously allocated headers and instead leaks the memory. Further, this error condition fails silently and is therefore not easily detected by an application.

This flaw allows a malicious HTTP server to set "super cookies" in curl that are then passed back to more origins than what is otherwise allowed or possible. This allows a site to set cookies that then would get sent to different and unrelated sites and domains. It could do this by exploiting a mixed case flaw in curl's function that verifies a given cookie domain against the Public Suffix List (PSL). For example a cookie could be set with `domain=co.UK` when the URL used a lower case hostname `curl.co.uk`, even though `co.uk` is listed as a PSL domain.

This flaw allows an attacker to insert cookies at will into a running program using libcurl, if the specific series of conditions are met. libcurl performs transfers. In its API, an application creates "easy handles" that are the individual handles for single transfers. libcurl provides a function call that duplicates en easy handle called [curl_easy_duphandle](https://curl.se/libcurl/c/curl_easy_duphandle.html). If a transfer has cookies enabled when the handle is duplicated, the cookie-enable state is also cloned - but without cloning the actual cookies. If the source handle did not read any cookies from a specific file on disk, the cloned version of the handle would instead store the file name as `none` (using the four ASCII letters, no quotes). Subsequent use of the cloned handle that does not explicitly set a source to load cookies from would then inadvertently load cookies from a file named `none` - if such a file exists and is readable in the current directory of the program using libcurl. And if using the correct file format of course.

This flaw makes curl overflow a heap based buffer in the SOCKS5 proxy handshake. When curl is asked to pass along the host name to the SOCKS5 proxy to allow that to resolve the address instead of it getting done by curl itself, the maximum length that host name can be is 255 bytes. If the host name is detected to be longer, curl switches to local name resolving and instead passes on the resolved address only. Due to this bug, the local variable that means "let the host resolve the name" could get the wrong value during a slow SOCKS5 handshake, and contrary to the intention, copy the too long host name to the target buffer instead of copying just the resolved address there. The target buffer being a heap based buffer, and the host name coming from the URL that curl has been told to operate with.

When curl retrieves an HTTP response, it stores the incoming headers so that they can be accessed later via the libcurl headers API. However, curl did not have a limit in how many or how large headers it would accept in a response, allowing a malicious server to stream an endless series of headers and eventually cause curl to run out of heap memory.

An improper certificate validation vulnerability exists in curl <v8.1.0 in the way it supports matching of wildcard patterns when listed as "Subject Alternative Name" in TLS server certificates. curl can be built to use its own name matching function for TLS rather than one provided by a TLS library. This private wildcard matching function would match IDN (International Domain Name) hosts incorrectly and could as a result accept patterns that otherwise should mismatch. IDN hostnames are converted to puny code before used for certificate checks. Puny coded names always start with `xn--` and should not be allowed to pattern match, but the wildcard check in curl could still check for `x*`, which would match even though the IDN name most likely contained nothing even resembling an `x`.

A use after free vulnerability exists in curl <v8.1.0 in the way libcurl offers a feature to verify an SSH server's public key using a SHA 256 hash. When this check fails, libcurl would free the memory for the fingerprint before it returns an error message containing the (now freed) hash. This flaw risks inserting sensitive heap-based data into the error message that might be shown to users or otherwise get leaked and revealed.

An authentication bypass vulnerability exists libcurl <8.0.0 in the connection reuse feature which can reuse previously established connections with incorrect user permissions due to a failure to check for changes in the CURLOPT_GSSAPI_DELEGATION option. This vulnerability affects krb5/kerberos/negotiate/GSSAPI transfers and could potentially result in unauthorized access to sensitive information. The safest option is to not reuse connections if the CURLOPT_GSSAPI_DELEGATION option has been changed.

An authentication bypass vulnerability exists in libcurl <8.0.0 in the FTP connection reuse feature that can result in wrong credentials being used during subsequent transfers. Previously created connections are kept in a connection pool for reuse if they match the current setup. However, certain FTP settings such as CURLOPT_FTP_ACCOUNT, CURLOPT_FTP_ALTERNATIVE_TO_USER, CURLOPT_FTP_SSL_CCC, and CURLOPT_USE_SSL were not included in the configuration match checks, causing them to match too easily. This could lead to libcurl using the wrong credentials when performing a transfer, potentially allowing unauthorized access to sensitive information.

An allocation of resources without limits or throttling vulnerability exists in curl <v7.88.0 based on the "chained" HTTP compression algorithms, meaning that a server response can be compressed multiple times and potentially with differentalgorithms. The number of acceptable "links" in this "decompression chain" wascapped, but the cap was implemented on a per-header basis allowing a maliciousserver to insert a virtually unlimited number of compression steps simply byusing many headers. The use of such a decompression chain could result in a "malloc bomb", making curl end up spending enormous amounts of allocated heap memory, or trying to and returning out of memory errors.

A use after free vulnerability exists in curl <7.87.0. Curl can be asked to *tunnel* virtually all protocols it supports through an HTTP proxy. HTTP proxies can (and often do) deny such tunnel operations. When getting denied to tunnel the specific protocols SMB or TELNET, curl would use a heap-allocated struct after it had been freed, in its transfer shutdown code path.

When doing HTTP(S) transfers, libcurl might erroneously use the read callback (`CURLOPT_READFUNCTION`) to ask for data to send, even when the `CURLOPT_POSTFIELDS` option has been set, if the same handle previously was used to issue a `PUT` request which used that callback. This flaw may surprise the application and cause it to misbehave and either send off the wrong data or use memory after free or similar in the subsequent `POST` request. The problem exists in the logic for a reused handle when it is changed from a PUT to a POST.

curl before 7.86.0 has a double free. If curl is told to use an HTTP proxy for a transfer with a non-HTTP(S) URL, it sets up the connection to the remote server by issuing a CONNECT request to the proxy, and then tunnels the rest of the protocol through. An HTTP proxy might refuse this request (HTTP proxies often only allow outgoing connections to specific port numbers, like 443 for HTTPS) and instead return a non-200 status code to the client. Due to flaws in the error/cleanup handling, this could trigger a double free in curl if one of the following schemes were used in the URL for the transfer: dict, gopher, gophers, ldap, ldaps, rtmp, rtmps, or telnet. The earliest affected version is 7.77.0.

When curl is used to retrieve and parse cookies from a HTTP(S) server, itaccepts cookies using control codes that when later are sent back to a HTTPserver might make the server return 400 responses. Effectively allowing a"sister site" to deny service to all siblings.

When curl < 7.84.0 does FTP transfers secured by krb5, it handles message verification failures wrongly. This flaw makes it possible for a Man-In-The-Middle attack to go unnoticed and even allows it to inject data to the client.

curl < 7.84.0 supports "chained" HTTP compression algorithms, meaning that a serverresponse can be compressed multiple times and potentially with different algorithms. The number of acceptable "links" in this "decompression chain" was unbounded, allowing a malicious server to insert a virtually unlimited number of compression steps.The use of such a decompression chain could result in a "malloc bomb", makingcurl end up spending enormous amounts of allocated heap memory, or trying toand returning out of memory errors.

libcurl would reuse a previously created connection even when a TLS or SSHrelated option had been changed that should have prohibited reuse.libcurl keeps previously used connections in a connection pool for subsequenttransfers to reuse if one of them matches the setup. However, several TLS andSSH settings were left out from the configuration match checks, making themmatch too easily.

libcurl provides the `CURLOPT_CERTINFO` option to allow applications torequest details to be returned about a server's certificate chain.Due to an erroneous function, a malicious server could make libcurl built withNSS get stuck in a never-ending busy-loop when trying to retrieve thatinformation.

The curl URL parser wrongly accepts percent-encoded URL separators like '/'when decoding the host name part of a URL, making it a *different* URL usingthe wrong host name when it is later retrieved.For example, a URL like `http://example.com%2F127.0.0.1/`, would be allowed bythe parser and get transposed into `http://example.com/127.0.0.1/`. This flawcan be used to circumvent filters, checks and more.

libcurl wrongly allows cookies to be set for Top Level Domains (TLDs) if thehost name is provided with a trailing dot.curl can be told to receive and send cookies. curl's "cookie engine" can bebuilt with or without [Public Suffix List](https://publicsuffix.org/)awareness. If PSL support not provided, a more rudimentary check exists to atleast prevent cookies from being set on TLDs. This check was broken if thehost name in the URL uses a trailing dot.This can allow arbitrary sites to set cookies that then would get sent to adifferent and unrelated site or domain.

A use of incorrectly resolved name vulnerability fixed in 7.83.1 might remove the wrong file when `--no-clobber` is used together with `--remove-on-error`.

A insufficiently protected credentials vulnerability in fixed in curl 7.83.0 might leak authentication or cookie header data on HTTP redirects to the same host but another port number.

An information disclosure vulnerability exists in curl 7.65.0 to 7.82.0 are vulnerable that by using an IPv6 address that was in the connection pool but with a different zone id it could reuse a connection instead.

An insufficiently protected credentials vulnerability exists in curl 4.9 to and include curl 7.82.0 are affected that could allow an attacker to extract credentials when follows HTTP(S) redirects is used with authentication could leak credentials to other services that exist on different protocols or port numbers.

An improper authentication vulnerability exists in curl 7.33.0 to and including 7.82.0 which might allow reuse OAUTH2-authenticated connections without properly making sure that the connection was authenticated with the same credentials as set for this transfer. This affects SASL-enabled protocols: SMPTP(S), IMAP(S), POP3(S) and LDAP(S) (openldap only).

When curl >= 7.20.0 and <= 7.78.0 connects to an IMAP or POP3 server to retrieve data using STARTTLS to upgrade to TLS security, the server can respond and send back multiple responses at once that curl caches. curl would then upgrade to TLS but not flush the in-queue of cached responses but instead continue using and trustingthe responses it got *before* the TLS handshake as if they were authenticated.Using this flaw, it allows a Man-In-The-Middle attacker to first inject the fake responses, then pass-through the TLS traffic from the legitimate server and trick curl into sending data back to the user thinking the attacker's injected data comes from the TLS-protected server.

A user can tell curl >= 7.20.0 and <= 7.78.0 to require a successful upgrade to TLS when speaking to an IMAP, POP3 or FTP server (`--ssl-reqd` on the command line or`CURLOPT_USE_SSL` set to `CURLUSESSL_CONTROL` or `CURLUSESSL_ALL` withlibcurl). This requirement could be bypassed if the server would return a properly crafted but perfectly legitimate response.This flaw would then make curl silently continue its operations **withoutTLS** contrary to the instructions and expectations, exposing possibly sensitive data in clear text over the network.

When sending data to an MQTT server, libcurl <= 7.73.0 and 7.78.0 could in some circumstances erroneously keep a pointer to an already freed memory area and both use that again in a subsequent call to send data and also free it *again*.

curl supports the `-t` command line option, known as `CURLOPT_TELNETOPTIONS`in libcurl. This rarely used option is used to send variable=content pairs toTELNET servers.Due to flaw in the option parser for sending `NEW_ENV` variables, libcurlcould be made to pass on uninitialized data from a stack based buffer to theserver. Therefore potentially revealing sensitive internal information to theserver using a clear-text network protocol.This could happen because curl did not call and use sscanf() correctly whenparsing the string provided by the application.

libcurl keeps previously used connections in a connection pool for subsequenttransfers to reuse, if one of them matches the setup.Due to errors in the logic, the config matching function did not take 'issuercert' into account and it compared the involved paths *case insensitively*,which could lead to libcurl reusing wrong connections.File paths are, or can be, case sensitive on many systems but not all, and caneven vary depending on used file systems.The comparison also didn't include the 'issuer cert' which a transfer can setto qualify how to verify the server certificate.

curl 7.75.0 through 7.76.1 suffers from a use-after-free vulnerability resulting in already freed memory being used when a TLS 1.3 session ticket arrives over a connection. A malicious server can use this in rare unfortunate circumstances to potentially reach remote code execution in the client. When libcurl at run-time sets up support for TLS 1.3 session tickets on a connection using OpenSSL, it stores pointers to the transfer in-memory object for later retrieval when a session ticket arrives. If the connection is used by multiple transfers (like with a reused HTTP/1.1 connection or multiplexed HTTP/2 connection) that first transfer object might be freed before the new session is established on that connection and then the function will access a memory buffer that might be freed. When using that memory, libcurl might even call a function pointer in the object, making it possible for a remote code execution if the server could somehow manage to get crafted memory content into the correct place in memory.

curl 7.7 through 7.76.1 suffers from an information disclosure when the `-t` command line option, known as `CURLOPT_TELNETOPTIONS` in libcurl, is used to send variable=content pairs to TELNET servers. Due to a flaw in the option parser for sending NEW_ENV variables, libcurl could be made to pass on uninitialized data from a stack based buffer to the server, resulting in potentially revealing sensitive internal information to the server using a clear-text network protocol.

curl 7.63.0 to and including 7.75.0 includes vulnerability that allows a malicious HTTPS proxy to MITM a connection due to bad handling of TLS 1.3 session tickets. When using a HTTPS proxy and TLS 1.3, libcurl can confuse session tickets arriving from the HTTPS proxy but work as if they arrived from the remote server and then wrongly "short-cut" the host handshake. When confusing the tickets, a HTTPS proxy can trick libcurl to use the wrong session ticket resume for the host and thereby circumvent the server TLS certificate check and make a MITM attack to be possible to perform unnoticed. Note that such a malicious HTTPS proxy needs to provide a certificate that curl will accept for the MITMed server for an attack to work - unless curl has been told to ignore the server certificate check.