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Home > CWE List > CWE-282: Improper Ownership Management (4.16)  
ID

CWE-282: Improper Ownership Management

Weakness ID: 282
Vulnerability Mapping: ALLOWED This CWE ID could be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities in limited situations requiring careful review (with careful review of mapping notes)
Abstraction: Class 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.
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+ Description
The product assigns the wrong ownership, or does not properly verify the ownership, of an object or resource.
+ Common Consequences
Section HelpThis 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
Access Control

Technical Impact: Gain Privileges or Assume Identity

+ Potential Mitigations

Phases: Architecture and Design; Operation

Very carefully manage the setting, management, and handling of privileges. Explicitly manage trust zones in the software.
+ Relationships
Section Help 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 Pillar Pillar - a weakness that is the most abstract type of weakness and represents a theme for all class/base/variant weaknesses related to it. A Pillar is different from a Category as a Pillar is still technically a type of weakness that describes a mistake, while a Category represents a common characteristic used to group related things. 284 Improper Access Control
ParentOf 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. 283 Unverified Ownership
ParentOf 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. 708 Incorrect Ownership Assignment
Section Help 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 "Architectural Concepts" (CWE-1008)
Nature Type ID Name
MemberOf Category Category - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic. 1011 Authorize Actors
+ Modes Of Introduction
Section HelpThe 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
Architecture and Design REALIZATION: This weakness is caused during implementation of an architectural security tactic.
+ Applicable Platforms
Section HelpThis 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)

+ Demonstrative Examples

Example 1

This function is part of a privileged program that takes input from users with potentially lower privileges.

(bad code)
Example Language: Python 
def killProcess(processID):
os.kill(processID, signal.SIGKILL)

This code does not confirm that the process to be killed is owned by the requesting user, thus allowing an attacker to kill arbitrary processes.

This function remedies the problem by checking the owner of the process before killing it:

(good code)
Example Language: Python 
def killProcess(processID):
user = getCurrentUser()

#Check process owner against requesting user
if getProcessOwner(processID) == user:
os.kill(processID, signal.SIGKILL)
return

else:
print("You cannot kill a process you don't own")
return

+ Observed Examples
Reference Description
Program runs setuid root but relies on a configuration file owned by a non-root user.
+ Detection Methods

Automated Static Analysis

Automated static analysis, commonly referred to as Static Application Security Testing (SAST), can find some instances of this weakness by analyzing source code (or binary/compiled code) without having to execute it. Typically, this is done by building a model of data flow and control flow, then searching for potentially-vulnerable patterns that connect "sources" (origins of input) with "sinks" (destinations where the data interacts with external components, a lower layer such as the OS, etc.)

Effectiveness: High

+ Affected Resources
  • File or Directory
+ Memberships
Section HelpThis 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 CategoryCategory - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic. 944 SFP Secondary Cluster: Access Management
MemberOf CategoryCategory - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic. 1396 Comprehensive Categorization: Access Control
+ Vulnerability Mapping Notes

Usage: ALLOWED-WITH-REVIEW

(this CWE ID could be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities in limited situations requiring careful review)

Reason: Abstraction

Rationale:

This CWE entry is a Class and might have Base-level children that would be more appropriate

Comments:

Examine children of this entry to see if there is a better fit
+ Notes

Maintenance

The relationships between privileges, permissions, and actors (e.g. users and groups) need further refinement within the Research view. One complication is that these concepts apply to two different pillars, related to control of resources (CWE-664) and protection mechanism failures (CWE-693).
+ Taxonomy Mappings
Mapped Taxonomy Name Node ID Fit Mapped Node Name
PLOVER Ownership errors
+ Content History
+ Submissions
Submission Date Submitter Organization
2006-07-19
(CWE Draft 3, 2006-07-19)
PLOVER
+ Modifications
Modification Date Modifier Organization
2008-07-01 Eric Dalci Cigital
updated Time_of_Introduction
2008-09-08 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Maintenance_Notes, Relationships, Taxonomy_Mappings
2009-12-28 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Potential_Mitigations
2010-06-21 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Potential_Mitigations
2011-03-29 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Relationships
2011-06-01 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Common_Consequences
2012-05-11 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Relationships
2014-07-30 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Relationships
2017-11-08 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Affected_Resources, Applicable_Platforms, Modes_of_Introduction, Relationships
2019-09-19 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Maintenance_Notes
2020-02-24 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Relationships
2023-01-31 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Description
2023-04-27 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Detection_Factors, Relationships
2023-06-29 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Mapping_Notes
2023-10-26 CWE Content Team MITRE
updated Demonstrative_Examples
+ Previous Entry Names
Change Date Previous Entry Name
2008-04-11 Ownership Issues
Page Last Updated: November 19, 2024