capnproto/capnproto-rust · Security

Cap'n Proto has Undefined Behavior in constant::Reader and StructSchema

GHSA ID
GHSA-5w5r-mf82-595p
Severity
critical
Published
Updated
CVSS v4
9.3 · CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N

Description

The safe API functions constant::Reader::get and StructSchema::new rely on PointerReader::get_root_unchecked, which can cause undefined behavior (UB) by constructing arbitrary words or schemas.

Reader::get

pub fn get(&self) -> Result<<T as Owned>::Reader<'static>> {
    // ...
    // UNSAFE: access `words` without validation
}

StructSchema::new

pub fn new(builder: RawBrandedStructSchema) -> StructSchema {
    // ...
    // UNSAFE: access encoded nodes without validation
}

This vulnerability allows safe Rust code to trigger UB, which violates Rust's safety guarantees.

The issue is resolved in version 0.24.0 by making constructor functions unsafe and mark the fields of struct as visible only in the crate.

CWEs

References