CVE-2011-2093 in LiveCycle
Summary
by MITRE
Adobe LiveCycle Data Services 3.1 and earlier, LiveCycle 9.0.0.2 and earlier, and BlazeDS 4.0.1 and earlier do not properly handle object graphs, which allows attackers to cause a denial of service via unspecified vectors, related to a "complex object graph vulnerability."
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 11/13/2021
Adobe LiveCycle Data Services and BlazeDS implementations contain a critical vulnerability in their object graph handling mechanisms that enables attackers to exploit memory consumption patterns through malformed object structures. This vulnerability resides in the serialization and deserialization processes where the system fails to properly validate or limit the depth and complexity of object graphs during data processing operations. The flaw allows maliciously crafted object hierarchies to trigger excessive memory allocation and processing cycles, leading to system resource exhaustion and potential denial of service conditions.
The technical implementation of this vulnerability stems from insufficient bounds checking and recursive traversal mechanisms within the data services frameworks. When processing incoming data streams, the systems attempt to reconstruct complex object graphs without adequate safeguards against deeply nested or circular references that could cause infinite loops or exponential memory growth. This behavior aligns with CWE-400 vulnerability classification, specifically addressing unchecked resource consumption through complex object structures. The vulnerability affects multiple Adobe products including LiveCycle Data Services versions 3.1 and earlier, LiveCycle 9.0.0.2 and earlier, and BlazeDS 4.0.1 and earlier, indicating a widespread implementation flaw across the Adobe data services ecosystem.
Operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple denial of service conditions to potentially compromise system availability and stability. Attackers can leverage this weakness by crafting specially designed object graphs that cause the target systems to consume excessive memory resources, leading to application crashes, service unavailability, and potential system instability. The vulnerability's exploitation does not require authentication and can be executed through various attack vectors including remote data injection or malformed API requests. This makes it particularly dangerous in enterprise environments where these services typically handle high volumes of data processing operations and may be exposed to untrusted data sources.
From an attack framework perspective, this vulnerability maps to multiple ATT&CK tactics including privilege escalation through resource exhaustion and denial of service operations. The exploitation pattern follows typical attack chains where initial reconnaissance leads to identification of vulnerable endpoints, followed by crafting of malicious object structures that trigger the memory consumption behavior. Organizations should implement immediate mitigations including input validation controls, object graph depth limits, and memory consumption monitoring. Network segmentation and access controls should be enforced to limit exposure of vulnerable services to untrusted networks. Regular patch management processes must be prioritized to address this vulnerability in affected Adobe products, as the underlying issue represents a fundamental flaw in data processing architecture that requires comprehensive system updates to resolve properly.