CVE-2014-2032 in Deadwood
Summary
by MITRE
Deadwood before 2.3.09, 3.x before 3.2.05, and as used in MaraDNS before 1.4.14 and 2.x before 2.0.09, allow remote attackers to cause a denial of service (out-of-bounds read and crash) by leveraging permission to perform recursive queries against Deadwood, related to missing input validation.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 02/05/2021
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2014-2032 affects Deadwood DNS server software and its integration within MaraDNS, representing a critical security flaw that enables remote attackers to execute denial of service attacks through carefully crafted recursive query requests. This vulnerability exists in multiple versions of Deadwood including pre-2.3.09, pre-3.2.05, and the corresponding MaraDNS versions prior to 1.4.14 and 2.0.09, indicating a widespread issue that has persisted across major releases of these DNS implementations.
The technical root cause of this vulnerability stems from inadequate input validation mechanisms within the recursive query processing functionality of Deadwood. When legitimate users with permission to perform recursive DNS queries submit malformed or specially crafted DNS requests, the software fails to properly validate the incoming data structures before processing them. This missing validation leads to out-of-bounds read operations that cause the application to crash and terminate unexpectedly. The vulnerability specifically manifests when the software attempts to access memory locations beyond the allocated buffer boundaries during recursive query handling, resulting in unpredictable behavior and system instability.
The operational impact of this vulnerability is significant as it allows remote attackers to disrupt DNS services without requiring authentication or elevated privileges. Any entity with access to perform recursive queries against the affected Deadwood instances can exploit this weakness to cause service interruptions, potentially affecting multiple domains and applications that rely on the compromised DNS infrastructure. The crash resulting from out-of-bounds reads can lead to complete service unavailability, forcing network administrators to restart services manually and potentially causing cascading failures in dependent systems that depend on proper DNS resolution for their operations.
This vulnerability maps to CWE-125 Out-of-bounds Read within the Common Weakness Enumeration framework, which specifically addresses situations where software reads data from memory locations beyond the intended buffer boundaries. The attack pattern aligns with techniques described in MITRE ATT&CK framework under T1499 Disruption of Services, where adversaries target system availability through memory corruption vulnerabilities. The flaw demonstrates poor input validation practices that are commonly exploited in DNS server implementations, making it a prime example of how insufficient security controls in network infrastructure components can be leveraged for service disruption attacks. Organizations using affected versions of Deadwood or MaraDNS should immediately implement patches and updates to address this vulnerability, while also considering network segmentation and access controls to limit who can perform recursive queries against DNS servers to reduce the attack surface.