CVE-2020-14297 in JBoss EAP
Summary
by MITRE
A flaw was discovered in Wildfly's EJB Client as shipped with Red Hat JBoss EAP 7, where some specific EJB transaction objects may get accumulated over the time and can cause services to slow down and eventaully unavailable. An attacker can take advantage and cause denial of service attack and make services unavailable.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 11/05/2020
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2020-14297 represents a significant denial of service weakness within the Wildfly EJB Client implementation found in Red Hat JBoss Enterprise Application Platform 7. This flaw manifests through the improper handling of EJB transaction objects that accumulate over time within the application server's memory space. The issue stems from the lack of proper resource cleanup mechanisms for transaction contexts, leading to memory leaks that gradually degrade system performance until complete service unavailability occurs. The vulnerability specifically affects the EJB client subsystem which manages distributed enterprise Java bean communications, making it particularly dangerous in enterprise environments where high availability and consistent performance are critical requirements.
The technical root cause of this vulnerability lies in the transaction object management within the EJB client layer, where transaction contexts are not properly disposed of after completion of their operations. This creates a memory accumulation pattern where each transaction object remains in memory even after the transaction has concluded, effectively creating a resource leak that worsens over time. The flaw is categorized under CWE-404, which addresses improper resource management, specifically focusing on memory leaks and resource accumulation issues. The vulnerability operates at the application layer and can be exploited through normal EJB client operations, making it particularly insidious as it can be triggered by legitimate application usage patterns rather than malicious attacks.
From an operational impact perspective, this vulnerability can severely compromise the availability and performance of enterprise applications running on JBoss EAP 7. The gradual accumulation of transaction objects leads to progressive degradation of system performance, manifesting as increased response times, reduced throughput, and eventually complete service unavailability. Attackers can exploit this vulnerability by initiating repeated EJB operations that create transaction contexts without proper cleanup, effectively causing a denial of service condition that can take hours or days to manifest fully. The ATT&CK framework categorizes this as a resource exhaustion technique, specifically targeting application-level resources through memory consumption patterns that can be difficult to detect in normal operational monitoring.
The mitigation strategies for CVE-2020-14297 primarily focus on applying the official patches released by Red Hat for JBoss EAP 7, which include fixes to the EJB client transaction management code. Organizations should also implement monitoring solutions that track memory usage patterns and transaction object counts to detect early signs of accumulation before they escalate to service disruption. Additionally, application architects should consider implementing transaction timeout mechanisms and proper resource management practices within their EJB applications to minimize the impact of such issues. System administrators should also configure appropriate memory limits and garbage collection settings to help contain the effects of memory accumulation, while maintaining regular application performance monitoring to identify unusual resource consumption patterns that may indicate the presence of this vulnerability.