Libcurl vulnerabilities

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.

libxml2 through 2.11.5 has a use-after-free that can only occur after a certain memory allocation fails. This occurs in xmlUnlinkNode in tree.c. NOTE: the vendor's position is "I don't think these issues are critical enough to warrant a CVE ID ... because an attacker typically can't control when memory allocations fail."

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 information disclosure vulnerability exists in curl <v8.1.0 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 wasused 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 second transfer. The problem exists in the logic for a reused handle when it is (expected to be) changed from a PUT to a POST.

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 denial of service vulnerability exists in curl <v8.1.0 in the way libcurl provides several different backends for resolving host names, selected at build time. If it is built to use the synchronous resolver, it allows name resolves to time-out slow operations using `alarm()` and `siglongjmp()`. When doing this, libcurl used a global buffer that was not mutex protected and a multi-threaded application might therefore crash or otherwise misbehave.

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 in libcurl prior to v8.0.0 where it reuses a previously established SSH connection despite the fact that an SSH option was modified, which should have prevented reuse. libcurl maintains a pool of previously used connections to reuse them for subsequent transfers if the configurations match. However, two SSH settings were omitted from the configuration check, allowing them to match easily, potentially leading to the reuse of an inappropriate connection.

A double free vulnerability exists in libcurl <8.0.0 when sharing HSTS data between separate "handles". This sharing was introduced without considerations for do this sharing across separate threads but there was no indication of this fact in the documentation. Due to missing mutexes or thread locks, two threads sharing the same HSTS data could end up doing a double-free or use-after-free.

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.

When curl < 7.84.0 saves cookies, alt-svc and hsts data to local files, it makes the operation atomic by finalizing the operation with a rename from a temporary name to the final target file name.In that rename operation, it might accidentally *widen* the permissions for the target file, leaving the updated file accessible to more users than intended.

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*.

libcurl-using applications can ask for a specific client certificate to be used in a transfer. This is done with the `CURLOPT_SSLCERT` option (`--cert` with the command line tool).When libcurl is built to use the macOS native TLS library Secure Transport, an application can ask for the client certificate by name or with a file name - using the same option. If the name exists as a file, it will be used instead of by name.If the appliction runs with a current working directory that is writable by other users (like `/tmp`), a malicious user can create a file name with the same name as the app wants to use by name, and thereby trick the application to use the file based cert instead of the one referred to by name making libcurl send the wrong client certificate in the TLS connection handshake.

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.

When curl is instructed to get content using the metalink feature, and a user name and password are used to download the metalink XML file, those same credentials are then subsequently passed on to each of the servers from which curl will download or try to download the contents from. Often contrary to the user's expectations and intentions and without telling the user it happened.

When curl is instructed to download content using the metalink feature, thecontents is verified against a hash provided in the metalink XML file.The metalink XML file points out to the client how to get the same contentfrom a set of different URLs, potentially hosted by different servers and theclient can then download the file from one or several of them. In a serial orparallel manner.If one of the servers hosting the contents has been breached and the contentsof the specific file on that server is replaced with a modified payload, curlshould detect this when the hash of the file mismatches after a completeddownload. It should remove the contents and instead try getting the contentsfrom another URL. This is not done, and instead such a hash mismatch is onlymentioned in text and the potentially malicious content is kept in the file ondisk.

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 7.61.0 through 7.76.1 suffers from exposure of data element to wrong session due to a mistake in the code for CURLOPT_SSL_CIPHER_LIST when libcurl is built to use the Schannel TLS library. The selected cipher set was stored in a single "static" variable in the library, which has the surprising side-effect that if an application sets up multiple concurrent transfers, the last one that sets the ciphers will accidentally control the set used by all transfers. In a worst-case scenario, this weakens transport security significantly.

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.

curl 7.1.1 to and including 7.75.0 is vulnerable to an "Exposure of Private Personal Information to an Unauthorized Actor" by leaking credentials in the HTTP Referer: header. libcurl does not strip off user credentials from the URL when automatically populating the Referer: HTTP request header field in outgoing HTTP requests, and therefore risks leaking sensitive data to the server that is the target of the second HTTP request.

curl 7.41.0 through 7.73.0 is vulnerable to an improper check for certificate revocation due to insufficient verification of the OCSP response.

curl 7.21.0 to and including 7.73.0 is vulnerable to uncontrolled recursion due to a stack overflow issue in FTP wildcard match parsing.

A malicious server can use the FTP PASV response to trick curl 7.73.0 and earlier into connecting back to a given IP address and port, and this way potentially make curl extract information about services that are otherwise private and not disclosed, for example doing port scanning and service banner extractions.

Due to use of a dangling pointer, libcurl 7.29.0 through 7.71.1 can use the wrong connection when sending data.