CWE-356: Missing User Interaction for Potentially Unsafe Action
Weakness ID: 356
Vulnerability Mapping:ALLOWEDThis CWE ID may be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities Abstraction:
BaseBase - a weakness that is still mostly independent of a resource or technology, but with sufficient details to provide specific methods for detection and prevention. Base level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 2 or 3 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, technology, language, and resource.
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Description
The product encounters a situation in which some
of its behavior is security-critical and should be authorized
by a human before progressing, but it does not properly
consult with the human user or its proxy (such as UI approval
dialogues or pre-set policies) to determine whether it is
allowed to perform the potentially dangerous
behavior.
Alternate Terms
Human-in-the-Loop
Used in various applications, especially for
AI/ML applications, to indicate situations in which the
human user must be consulted before determining the next
action to take.
HITL
Roles: Acronym
Acronym for "Human-in-the-Loop"
Common Consequences
This table specifies different individual consequences
associated with the weakness. The Scope identifies the application security area that is
violated, while the Impact describes the negative technical impact that arises if an
adversary succeeds in exploiting this weakness. The Likelihood provides information about
how likely the specific consequence is expected to be seen relative to the other
consequences in the list. For example, there may be high likelihood that a weakness will be
exploited to achieve a certain impact, but a low likelihood that it will be exploited to
achieve a different impact.
Impact
Details
Hide Activities
Scope: Non-Repudiation
This makes it easier for attackers to trick users into inflicting damage to their system.
Potential Mitigations
Phase(s)
Mitigation
Architecture and Design
Product systems should warn users that a potentially dangerous action may occur if the user proceeds. For example, if the user downloads a file from an unknown source and attempts to execute the file on their machine, then the application's GUI can indicate that the file is unsafe.
Relationships
This table shows the weaknesses and high level categories that are related to this
weakness. These relationships are defined as ChildOf, ParentOf, MemberOf and give insight to
similar items that may exist at higher and lower levels of abstraction. In addition,
relationships such as PeerOf, Overlaps, and CanAlsoBe are defined to show similar weaknesses that the user
may want to explore.
Relevant to the view "Complete Weakness Hierarchy" (View-1000)
Nature
Type
ID
Name
ChildOf
Class - a weakness that is described in a very abstract fashion, typically independent of any specific language or technology. More specific than a Pillar Weakness, but more general than a Base Weakness. Class level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 1 or 2 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, and resource.
Class - a weakness that is described in a very abstract fashion, typically independent of any specific language or technology. More specific than a Pillar Weakness, but more general than a Base Weakness. Class level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 1 or 2 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, and resource.
The different Modes of Introduction provide information
about how and when this
weakness may be introduced. The Phase identifies a point in the life cycle at which
introduction
may occur, while the Note provides a typical scenario related to introduction during the
given
phase.
Phase(s)
Note
Architecture and Design
The architecture or design might include a
component or potentially dangerous functionality that
could effectively act independently.
Implementation
A bug in the implementation could cause the product
to fail to recognize that it is about to perform a
dangerous operation requiring a human decision.
Applicable Platforms
This listing shows possible areas for which the given
weakness could appear. These
may be for specific named Languages, Operating Systems, Architectures, Paradigms,
Technologies,
or a class of such platforms. The platform is listed along with how frequently the given
weakness appears for that instance.
Type
Applicable Platforms
Notes
Languages
Class: Not Language-Specific
(Undetermined Prevalence)
Architectures
Class: Not Architecture-Specific
(Undetermined Prevalence)
Technologies
AI/ML
(Undetermined Prevalence)
Class: Not Technology-Specific
(Undetermined Prevalence)
Selected Observed
Examples
Note: this is a curated list of examples for users to understand the variety of ways in which this
weakness can be introduced. It is not a complete list of all CVEs that are related to this CWE entry.
Chain: Web browser does not prompt the user
before downloading an object that has an unrecognized
content type (CWE-356), leading to untrusted search path
(CWE-426) on a different OS.
AI agentic IDE product for cloud service
does not consult the "Human-in-the-Loop" (HITL) in some
security-critical decisions, allowing rewrite of its own
Model Context Protocol (MCP), leading to configuration
change and code execution [REF-1582].
AI agentic coding tool trusts a
potentially-untrusted configuration input, causing it to
skip a "trust confirmation dialog" before conducting
potentially dangerous actions.
Chain: E-mail client allows bypass of warning for dangerous attachments (CWE-356) via a Windows .LNK file that refers to the attachment (CWE-64).
Weakness Ordinalities
Ordinality
Description
Primary
(where the weakness exists independent of other weaknesses)
Resultant
(where the weakness is typically related to the presence of some other weaknesses)
Memberships
This MemberOf Relationships table shows additional CWE Categories and Views that
reference this weakness as a member. This information is often useful in understanding where a
weakness fits within the context of external information sources.
Nature
Type
ID
Name
MemberOf
Grouping - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.
(this CWE ID may be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities)
Reason
Acceptable-Use
Rationale
This CWE entry is at the Base level of abstraction, which is a preferred level of abstraction for mapping to the root causes of vulnerabilities.
Comments
Carefully read both the name and description to ensure that this mapping is an appropriate fit. Do not try to 'force' a mapping to a lower-level Base/Variant simply to comply with this preferred level of abstraction.
Notes
Relationship
Often resultant, e.g. in unhandled error conditions.
Relationship
Can overlap privilege errors, conceptually at least.
Description
This table specifies different individual consequences
associated with the weakness. The Scope identifies the application security area that is
violated, while the Impact describes the negative technical impact that arises if an
adversary succeeds in exploiting this weakness. The Likelihood provides information about
how likely the specific consequence is expected to be seen relative to the other
consequences in the list. For example, there may be high likelihood that a weakness will be
exploited to achieve a certain impact, but a low likelihood that it will be exploited to
achieve a different impact.
