CVE-2024-44445 in Smart Contract
Summary
by MITRE • 09/16/2024
An issue was discovered in BSC Smart Contract 0x0506e571aba3dd4c9d71bed479a4e6d40d95c833. Attackers are able to perform state manipulation attacks by borrowing a large amount of money and then using this amount to inflate the token balance in the token pair, leading to increased profits without cost.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 07/06/2026
This vulnerability represents a critical flaw in the BSC smart contract architecture that enables attackers to manipulate the protocol's state through strategic borrowing and token pair manipulation. The issue stems from insufficient validation mechanisms within the contract's liquidity calculation logic, allowing malicious actors to exploit the system by borrowing substantial amounts of funds and subsequently inflating their token balances within the pair contracts. This manipulation occurs at the core level where the contract fails to properly verify the legitimacy of balance changes during liquidity operations. The vulnerability directly impacts the integrity of the decentralized finance protocol by enabling profit generation without actual capital investment, creating an unsustainable economic model that undermines the trustless nature of the system. The flaw operates through a combination of overborrowing and artificial balance inflation, where attackers can manipulate the contract's internal state to reflect false token reserves.
The technical implementation of this attack vector demonstrates a fundamental weakness in the smart contract's mathematical validation processes, specifically within the liquidity pool calculations that govern token exchanges. The contract fails to implement proper checks on the relationship between borrowed amounts and resulting balance manipulations, allowing attackers to exploit arithmetic relationships that should normally prevent such state manipulation. This type of vulnerability aligns with CWE-129 and CWE-131 categories related to improper input validation and insufficient boundary checking in computing systems. The attack can be executed through multiple steps including initiating large borrow operations, manipulating the token pair reserves through strategic transactions, and then capitalizing on the inflated balances to generate profits without proportional capital commitment.
From an operational standpoint, this vulnerability poses severe risks to both individual users and the broader ecosystem by creating artificial profit opportunities that distort market dynamics and potentially lead to significant financial losses for legitimate participants. The impact extends beyond immediate monetary gains to include potential system instability through manipulation of liquidity pool ratios that affect all trading activities within the contract. Attackers can exploit this flaw repeatedly, creating cascading effects that may destabilize the entire protocol and erode user confidence in the platform's security measures. The attack methodology follows patterns consistent with ATT&CK technique T1078 which involves gaining access to systems through legitimate credentials or by exploiting system weaknesses, in this case through smart contract vulnerabilities rather than traditional authentication bypasses.
The recommended mitigation strategies include implementing comprehensive input validation mechanisms that verify all state changes against expected mathematical relationships and liquidity pool constraints. Contract developers should enforce strict boundaries on borrowing operations and implement real-time monitoring of unusual balance variations within token pairs. Additionally, the system requires enhanced audit processes that validate the consistency of reserve calculations and implement rate limiting mechanisms to prevent rapid state manipulations. Regular security assessments and formal verification of smart contract code should be mandated to identify similar vulnerabilities before they can be exploited. The implementation of multi-signature controls for critical operations and time delays on large transactions would further reduce the attack surface while maintaining system usability for legitimate users.