CVE-2020-35878 in ozone Crate
Summary
by MITRE • 12/31/2020
An issue was discovered in the ozone crate through 2020-07-04 for Rust. Memory safety is violated because of the dropping of uninitialized memory.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 06/27/2026
The vulnerability in the ozone crate represents a critical memory safety issue that emerged from improper handling of uninitialized memory during object destruction. This flaw exists within the rust programming environment where the crate fails to properly initialize memory before attempting to drop objects, creating potential pathways for memory corruption and arbitrary code execution. The vulnerability specifically targets the memory management subsystem of the crate, where destructors are invoked on memory locations that have not been properly initialized, leading to undefined behavior patterns that can be exploited by malicious actors.
This memory safety violation constitutes a direct breach of fundamental security principles and aligns with CWE-457, which describes "Use of Uninitialized Variable" as a critical weakness in software systems. The issue stems from the crate's failure to implement proper initialization protocols before memory deallocation operations, creating conditions where uninitialized memory segments may contain residual data or invalid pointers that can be manipulated during the drop process. The vulnerability is particularly concerning because it occurs at the core memory management layer where objects are being destroyed, making it difficult to predict or prevent without fundamental architectural changes.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple memory corruption to potentially enable privilege escalation and system compromise. Attackers could leverage this uninitialized memory issue to execute arbitrary code, corrupt data structures, or gain elevated privileges within applications that utilize the affected crate. The timing of the vulnerability during object destruction creates a window where malicious actors can manipulate memory contents before cleanup operations occur, particularly in environments where multiple threads or processes interact with shared resources. This makes the vulnerability especially dangerous in server applications and systems handling sensitive data.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability require immediate attention through code refactoring and implementation of proper initialization protocols before memory deallocation. Developers should ensure that all destructors properly initialize memory segments before invoking cleanup operations, implementing comprehensive testing procedures to validate memory states during object lifecycle management. The fix involves updating the crate's memory management functions to enforce proper initialization before drop operations, aligning with best practices outlined in the rust memory safety model and industry standards for secure coding. Regular security audits and static analysis tools should be employed to identify similar patterns across the codebase, while developers should adopt defensive programming techniques that prevent uninitialized variable usage throughout the application stack.
Security professionals should monitor for exploitation attempts targeting this specific vulnerability through network traffic analysis and system log monitoring, as the memory corruption patterns may manifest in unusual system behavior or performance degradation. The vulnerability's classification under ATT&CK technique T1059.008 for "Command and Scripting Interpreter" highlights potential exploitation vectors where attackers might leverage memory corruption to execute malicious commands within compromised systems, emphasizing the need for comprehensive incident response procedures and system hardening measures.