CWE - CWE-755: Improper Handling of Exceptional Conditions (4.16)

Weakness ID: 755

Vulnerability Mapping: DISCOURAGED This CWE ID should not be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities
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 does not handle or incorrectly handles an exceptional condition.

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
Other	Technical Impact: Other

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	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.	703	Improper Check or Handling of Exceptional Conditions
ParentOf	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.	209	Generation of Error Message Containing Sensitive Information
ParentOf	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.	248	Uncaught Exception
ParentOf	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.	274	Improper Handling of Insufficient Privileges
ParentOf	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.	280	Improper Handling of Insufficient Permissions or Privileges
ParentOf	Variant - a weakness that is linked to a certain type of product, typically involving a specific language or technology. More specific than a Base weakness. Variant level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 3 to 5 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, technology, language, and resource.	333	Improper Handling of Insufficient Entropy in TRNG
ParentOf	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.	390	Detection of Error Condition Without Action
ParentOf	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.	392	Missing Report of Error Condition
ParentOf	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.	395	Use of NullPointerException Catch to Detect NULL Pointer Dereference
ParentOf	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.	396	Declaration of Catch for Generic Exception
ParentOf	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.	460	Improper Cleanup on Thrown Exception
ParentOf	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.	544	Missing Standardized Error Handling Mechanism
ParentOf	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.	636	Not Failing Securely ('Failing Open')
ParentOf	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.	756	Missing Custom Error Page

Relevant to the view "Weaknesses for Simplified Mapping of Published Vulnerabilities" (CWE-1003)

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).	1003	Weaknesses for Simplified Mapping of Published Vulnerabilities

Relevant to the view "Architectural Concepts" (CWE-1008)

Nature	Type	ID	Name
MemberOf	Category - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	1020	Verify Message Integrity

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
Implementation	REALIZATION: This weakness is caused during implementation of an architectural security tactic.

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)

Likelihood Of Exploit

Medium

Demonstrative Examples

Example 1

The following example attempts to resolve a hostname.

(bad code)

Example Language: Java

protected void doPost (HttpServletRequest req, HttpServletResponse res) throws IOException {

String ip = req.getRemoteAddr();
InetAddress addr = InetAddress.getByName(ip);
...
out.println("hello " + addr.getHostName());

}

A DNS lookup failure will cause the Servlet to throw an exception.

Example 2

The following example attempts to allocate memory for a character. After the call to malloc, an if statement is used to check whether the malloc function failed.

(bad code)

Example Language: C

foo=malloc(sizeof(char)); //the next line checks to see if malloc failed
if (foo==NULL) {

//We do nothing so we just ignore the error.

}

The conditional successfully detects a NULL return value from malloc indicating a failure, however it does not do anything to handle the problem. Unhandled errors may have unexpected results and may cause the program to crash or terminate.

Instead, the if block should contain statements that either attempt to fix the problem or notify the user that an error has occurred and continue processing or perform some cleanup and gracefully terminate the program. The following example notifies the user that the malloc function did not allocate the required memory resources and returns an error code.

(good code)

Example Language: C

foo=malloc(sizeof(char)); //the next line checks to see if malloc failed
if (foo==NULL) {

printf("Malloc failed to allocate memory resources");
return -1;

}

Example 3

The following code mistakenly catches a NullPointerException.

(bad code)

Example Language: Java

try {

mysteryMethod();

} catch (NullPointerException npe) {
}

Observed Examples

Reference	Description
CVE-2023-41151	SDK for OPC Unified Architecture (OPC UA) server has uncaught exception when a socket is blocked for writing but the server tries to send an error
	Chain: JavaScript-based cryptocurrency library can fall back to the insecure Math.random() function instead of reporting a failure (CWE-392), thus reducing the entropy (CWE-332) and leading to generation of non-unique cryptographic keys for Bitcoin wallets (CWE-1391)
CVE-2021-3011	virtual interrupt controller in a virtualization product allows crash of host by writing a certain invalid value to a register, which triggers a fatal error instead of returning an error code
CVE-2008-4302	Chain: OS kernel does not properly handle a failure of a function call (CWE-755), leading to an unlock of a resource that was not locked (CWE-832), with resultant crash.

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	Category - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	880	CERT C++ Secure Coding Section 12 - Exceptions and Error Handling (ERR)
MemberOf	Category - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	962	SFP Secondary Cluster: Unchecked Status Condition
MemberOf	Category - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	1405	Comprehensive Categorization: Improper Check or Handling of Exceptional Conditions

Vulnerability Mapping Notes

Usage: DISCOURAGED

(this CWE ID should not be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities)

Reason: Abstraction

Rationale:

This CWE entry is a level-1 Class (i.e., a child of a Pillar). It might have lower-level children that would be more appropriate

Comments:

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

References

[REF-1374] Unciphered. "Randstorm: You Can't Patch a House of Cards". 2023-11-14. <https://www.unciphered.com/blog/randstorm-you-cant-patch-a-house-of-cards>. URL validated: 2023-11-15.

Content History

Submissions
Submission Date	Submitter	Organization
2009-03-03 (CWE 1.3, 2009-03-10)	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2009-03-03 (CWE 1.3, 2009-03-10)	New entry for reorganization of CWE-703.
Modifications
Modification Date	Modifier	Organization
2009-12-28	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2009-12-28	updated Applicable_Platforms, Likelihood_of_Exploit, Time_of_Introduction
2010-12-13	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2010-12-13	updated Description, Observed_Examples
2011-03-29	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2011-03-29	updated Relationships
2011-06-01	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2011-06-01	updated Common_Consequences
2011-09-13	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2011-09-13	updated Relationships, Taxonomy_Mappings
2012-05-11	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2012-05-11	updated Relationships
2014-07-30	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2014-07-30	updated Relationships
2017-01-19	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2017-01-19	updated Relationships
2017-11-08	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2017-11-08	updated Likelihood_of_Exploit, Modes_of_Introduction, Relationships, Taxonomy_Mappings
2019-06-20	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2019-06-20	updated Relationships
2020-02-24	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2020-02-24	updated Relationships
2020-06-25	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2020-06-25	updated Relationships
2021-10-28	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2021-10-28	updated Observed_Examples
2022-04-28	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2022-04-28	updated Relationships
2023-01-31	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2023-01-31	updated Description, Relationships
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, Relationships
2024-02-29 (CWE 4.14, 2024-02-29)	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2024-02-29 (CWE 4.14, 2024-02-29)	updated Demonstrative_Examples, Mapping_Notes, Observed_Examples, References, Relationships


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Common Weakness Enumeration

CWE-755: Improper Handling of Exceptional Conditions

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