CVE-2018-14733 in Community Association
Summary
by MITRE
The Odoo Community Association (OCA) dbfilter_from_header module makes Odoo 8.x, 9.x, 10.x, and 11.x vulnerable to ReDoS (regular expression denial of service) under certain circumstances.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 10/17/2023
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2018-14733 affects the Odoo Community Association dbfilter_from_header module across multiple versions of the Odoo ERP platform including 8.x, 9.x, 10.x, and 11.x. This issue represents a critical security flaw that exploits the module's handling of regular expressions within header-based database filtering mechanisms. The vulnerability arises from the module's improper implementation of regular expression patterns that process HTTP headers containing database selection information. When maliciously crafted headers are processed through the vulnerable regular expression engine, the system becomes susceptible to regular expression denial of service attacks that can consume excessive computational resources and potentially lead to system unavailability.
The technical flaw manifests in the module's use of regular expressions that are vulnerable to catastrophic backtracking when processing specific input patterns. This type of vulnerability falls under the Common Weakness Enumeration category CWE-1321 which specifically addresses regular expression denial of service conditions. The vulnerable implementation occurs when the dbfilter_from_header module processes HTTP headers containing database names or filtering patterns that trigger inefficient backtracking behavior in the regular expression engine. Attackers can exploit this by crafting malicious HTTP headers with carefully constructed patterns that cause the regular expression processor to perform exponential time complexity operations, leading to resource exhaustion and service disruption.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple service disruption to encompass potential business continuity risks for organizations relying on Odoo platforms. When exploited, the ReDoS attack can cause the Odoo application to become unresponsive or crash entirely, affecting multiple concurrent users and potentially impacting critical business operations. The vulnerability affects organizations using the dbfilter_from_header module for implementing header-based database routing, which is commonly used in multi-tenant deployments or when implementing custom authentication flows. The attack vector requires only the ability to send specially crafted HTTP requests to the vulnerable Odoo instances, making it particularly dangerous as it can be exploited by remote attackers without requiring authentication credentials.
Organizations should implement immediate mitigations including updating to patched versions of the dbfilter_from_header module or applying custom patches that address the regular expression vulnerability. The recommended approach involves replacing vulnerable regular expression patterns with more efficient alternatives that do not exhibit catastrophic backtracking behavior. Additionally, implementing proper input validation and sanitization measures can help prevent malicious header values from reaching the vulnerable regular expression processing code. Network-level protections such as rate limiting and header validation can serve as additional defensive measures to reduce the impact of potential exploitation attempts. Security monitoring should be enhanced to detect unusual patterns of HTTP requests that may indicate ReDoS attack attempts, and organizations should consider implementing web application firewalls to provide additional layers of protection against such attacks. The vulnerability demonstrates the importance of proper regular expression design and the potential consequences of inadequate input validation in enterprise applications, aligning with ATT&CK technique T1499.004 which covers network denial of service attacks through resource exhaustion.