CVE-2025-53604 in web-push Crate
Summary
by MITRE • 07/05/2025
The web-push crate before 0.10.3 for Rust allows a denial of service (memory consumption) in the built-in clients via a large integer in a Content-Length header.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 07/05/2025
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2025-53604 affects the web-push crate version 0.10.3 and earlier in the Rust programming language ecosystem. This issue represents a denial of service condition that specifically targets the built-in client implementations within the crate. The flaw manifests when the system processes HTTP requests containing excessively large integer values in the Content-Length header field, which can lead to uncontrolled memory consumption patterns that ultimately compromise system availability.
The technical root cause of this vulnerability stems from inadequate input validation within the web-push crate's HTTP client implementation. When processing incoming HTTP responses, the crate fails to properly validate or constrain the integer values specified in the Content-Length header. This allows malicious actors to craft HTTP responses with extraordinarily large Content-Length values that cause the client to attempt allocating excessive memory resources. The vulnerability is classified under CWE-770, which deals with allocation of resources without limits or with insufficient limits, making it particularly dangerous in resource-constrained environments.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple service disruption to potentially enable more sophisticated attack vectors within networked applications. Systems utilizing the affected web-push crate may experience memory exhaustion, leading to application crashes, system instability, or complete service unavailability. This type of denial of service attack can be particularly devastating in production environments where memory resources are limited or where the affected applications handle high volumes of concurrent requests. The vulnerability affects any application that relies on the web-push crate for handling push notifications or web push protocol implementations.
Mitigation strategies for CVE-2025-53604 primarily involve upgrading to version 0.10.3 or later of the web-push crate where the issue has been resolved through proper input validation and resource limit enforcement. Organizations should implement comprehensive patch management procedures to ensure all affected dependencies are updated across their application environments. Additionally, network-level controls such as rate limiting and content-length header validation at proxy or gateway levels can provide defensive measures against exploitation attempts. The fix typically incorporates proper bounds checking on integer values in Content-Length headers and implements reasonable limits on memory allocation requests to prevent unbounded resource consumption patterns that could be exploited by attackers.
From an ATT&CK framework perspective, this vulnerability maps to the T1499.004 technique related to Network Denial of Service and potentially T1566.001 for initial access through malicious web content. The vulnerability demonstrates how seemingly minor input validation flaws can create significant security implications when operating in distributed systems. Security teams should monitor their dependency trees for similar patterns and implement automated scanning tools to identify and remediate vulnerable components across their software supply chains. The incident also highlights the importance of proper resource management practices in memory-constrained environments where such vulnerabilities can be amplified by the scale of concurrent operations.