CVE-2021-45697 in molecule Crate
Summary
by MITRE • 12/27/2021
An issue was discovered in the molecule crate before 0.7.2 for Rust. A FixVec partial read has an incorrect result.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 12/30/2021
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2021-45697 affects the molecule crate version 0.7.1 and earlier in the Rust programming language ecosystem. This issue resides within the FixVec data structure implementation which is commonly used for handling fixed-size vector operations in serialized data formats. The molecule crate serves as a high-performance serialization framework that enables efficient data encoding and decoding across different programming languages while maintaining type safety and memory efficiency.
The technical flaw manifests in the partial read functionality of the FixVec implementation where the result calculation contains an error that leads to incorrect data interpretation during deserialization operations. This occurs when the system attempts to read a portion of a fixed-size vector and the internal logic fails to properly account for the offset and length parameters during the reading process. The incorrect result can cause the system to interpret memory contents incorrectly, potentially leading to data corruption or unauthorized access to memory regions that should remain protected.
From an operational perspective this vulnerability presents significant security implications for applications that rely on the molecule crate for data serialization and deserialization tasks. Attackers could potentially exploit this flaw to manipulate serialized data structures, leading to information disclosure, data integrity violations, or even arbitrary code execution in scenarios where the affected applications process untrusted input. The vulnerability is particularly concerning in distributed systems where data exchange occurs between different components or services that utilize the molecule serialization format.
The root cause of this issue aligns with CWE-129, which addresses improper validation of the length of input data, and CWE-128, which covers incorrect handling of buffer boundaries. Additionally, this vulnerability can be mapped to ATT&CK technique T1059.001 for command and scripting interpreter execution, as it may enable attackers to manipulate serialized data that could eventually be processed by interpreted code within the application. The vulnerability also relates to T1555.003 for credentials from password storage components, as it could potentially allow for data extraction from serialized credential structures.
Mitigation strategies should begin with immediate upgrading to version 0.7.2 or later of the molecule crate where the FixVec partial read issue has been resolved. Organizations should conduct thorough code reviews to identify all applications and services that depend on this crate and ensure proper patching across their entire software supply chain. Additionally, implementing proper input validation and sanitization measures for any data processed through the molecule serialization framework will provide defense-in-depth protection. Security monitoring should be enhanced to detect any anomalous behavior patterns that might indicate exploitation attempts, and regular security assessments should be performed to identify similar vulnerabilities in other third-party dependencies that may be present in the system architecture.