CWE - CWE-1277: Firmware Not Updateable (4.16)

Weakness ID: 1277

Vulnerability Mapping: ALLOWED This CWE ID may be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities
Abstraction: Base Base - 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 does not provide its users with the ability to update or patch its firmware to address any vulnerabilities or weaknesses that may be present.

Extended Description

Without the ability to patch or update firmware, consumers will be left vulnerable to exploitation of any known vulnerabilities, or any vulnerabilities that are discovered in the future. This can expose consumers to permanent risk throughout the entire lifetime of the device, which could be years or decades. Some external protective measures and mitigations might be employed to aid in preventing or reducing the risk of malicious attack, but the root weakness cannot be corrected.

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.

Scope	Impact	Likelihood
Confidentiality Integrity Access Control Authentication Authorization	Technical Impact: Gain Privileges or Assume Identity; Bypass Protection Mechanism; Execute Unauthorized Code or Commands; DoS: Crash, Exit, or Restart If an attacker can identify an exploitable vulnerability in one device that has no means of patching, the attack may be used against an entire class of devices.	Medium

Potential Mitigations

Phase: Requirements

Specify requirements to include the ability to update the firmware. Include integrity checks and authentication to ensure that untrusted firmware cannot be installed.

Phase: Architecture and Design

Design the device to allow for updating the firmware. Ensure that the design specifies how to distribute the updates and ensure their integrity and authentication.

Phase: Implementation

Implement the necessary functionality to allow the firmware to be updated.

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 and CanAlsoBe are defined to show similar weaknesses that the user may want to explore.

Relevant to the view "Research Concepts" (CWE-1000)

Nature	Type	ID	Name
ChildOf	Base - 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.	1329	Reliance on Component That is Not Updateable

Relevant to the view "Hardware Design" (CWE-1194)

Nature	Type	ID	Name
MemberOf	Category - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	1208	Cross-Cutting Problems

Modes Of Introduction

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	Note
Requirements	Requirements development might not consider the importance of updates over the lifetime of the product, or might not choose the ability due to concerns such as expense or speed to market.
Architecture and Design	Lack of planning during architecture development and design, or external pressures such as speed to market, could ignore the capability to update.
Implementation	The weakness can appear through oversight during implementation.

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.

Languages

Class: Not Language-Specific (Undetermined Prevalence)

Operating Systems

Class: Not OS-Specific (Undetermined Prevalence)

Architectures

Class: Not Architecture-Specific (Undetermined Prevalence)

Technologies

Class: Not Technology-Specific (Undetermined Prevalence)

Demonstrative Examples

Example 1

A refrigerator has an Internet interface for the official purpose of alerting the manufacturer when that refrigerator detects a fault. Because the device is attached to the Internet, the refrigerator is a target for hackers who may wish to use the device other potentially more nefarious purposes.

(bad code)

Example Language: Other

The refrigerator has no means of patching and is hacked becoming a spewer of email spam.

(good code)

Example Language: Other

The device automatically patches itself and provides considerable more protection against being hacked.

Observed Examples

Reference	Description
CVE-2020-9054	Chain: network-attached storage (NAS) device has a critical OS command injection (CWE-78) vulnerability that is actively exploited to place IoT devices into a botnet, but some products are "end-of-support" and cannot be patched (CWE-1277). [REF-1097]
	A hardware "smart lock" has weak key generation that allows attackers to steal the key by BLE sniffing, but the device's firmware cannot be upgraded and hence remains vulnerable [REF-1095].

Weakness Ordinalities

Ordinality	Description
Primary	(where the weakness exists independent of other weaknesses)

Detection Methods

Manual Analysis

Create a new installable boot image of the current build with a minor version number change. Use the standard installation method to update the boot image. Verify that the minor version number has changed. Create a fake image. Verify that the boot updater will not install the fake image and generates an "invalid image" error message or equivalent.

Effectiveness: High

Architecture or Design Review

Check the consumer or maintainer documentation, the architecture/design documentation, or the original requirements to ensure that the documentation includes details for how to update the firmware.

Effectiveness: Moderate

Manual Dynamic Analysis

Determine if there is a lack of a capability to update read-only memory (ROM) structure. This could manifest as a difference between the latest firmware version and the current version within the device.

Effectiveness: High

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	View - a subset of CWE entries that provides a way of examining CWE content. The two main view structures are Slices (flat lists) and Graphs (containing relationships between entries).	1343	Weaknesses in the 2021 CWE Most Important Hardware Weaknesses List
MemberOf	Category - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	1415	Comprehensive Categorization: Resource Control

Vulnerability Mapping Notes

Usage: ALLOWED

(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

Terminology

The "firmware" term does not have a single commonly-shared definition, so there may be variations in how this CWE entry is interpreted during mapping.

Related Attack Patterns

CAPEC-ID	Attack Pattern Name
CAPEC-682	Exploitation of Firmware or ROM Code with Unpatchable Vulnerabilities

References

[REF-1095] Matthew Hughes. "Bad news: KeyWe Smart Lock is easily bypassed and can't be fixed". 2019-12-11. <https://www.theregister.com/2019/12/11/f_secure_keywe/>. URL validated: 2023-04-07.

[REF-1096] Alex Scroxton. "Alarm bells ring, the IoT is listening". <https://www.computerweekly.com/news/252475324/Alarm-bells-ring-the-IoT-is-listening>.

[REF-1097] Brian Krebs. "Zyxel Flaw Powers New Mirai IoT Botnet Strain". 2020-03-20. <https://krebsonsecurity.com/2020/03/zxyel-flaw-powers-new-mirai-iot-botnet-strain/>.

Content History

Submissions
Submission Date	Submitter	Organization
2020-05-13 (CWE 4.1, 2020-02-24)	Paul A. Wortman	Wells Fargo
2020-05-13 (CWE 4.1, 2020-02-24)
Contributions
Contribution Date	Contributor	Organization
2021-10-12	Paul A. Wortman	Wells Fargo
2021-10-12	provided detection methods and observed examples
Modifications
Modification Date	Modifier	Organization
2020-08-20	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2020-08-20	updated Common_Consequences, Demonstrative_Examples, Description, Potential_Mitigations
2020-12-10	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2020-12-10	updated Description, Relationships
2021-03-15	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2021-03-15	updated Maintenance_Notes
2021-07-20	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2021-07-20	updated Demonstrative_Examples, Maintenance_Notes
2021-10-28	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2021-10-28	updated Common_Consequences, Description, Detection_Factors, Maintenance_Notes, Modes_of_Introduction, Observed_Examples, References, Relationships, Terminology_Notes, Weakness_Ordinalities
2022-04-28	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2022-04-28	updated Detection_Factors, Observed_Examples, Potential_Mitigations, Relationships
2022-10-13	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2022-10-13	updated Related_Attack_Patterns
2023-04-27	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2023-04-27	updated Relationships
2023-06-29	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2023-06-29	updated Mapping_Notes


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Common Weakness Enumeration

CWE-1277: Firmware Not Updateable

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