CAPEC-682: Exploitation of Firmware or ROM Code with Unpatchable Vulnerabilities

Description
An adversary may exploit vulnerable code (i.e., firmware or ROM) that is unpatchable. Unpatchable devices exist due to manufacturers intentionally or inadvertently designing devices incapable of updating their software. Additionally, with updatable devices, the manufacturer may decide not to support the device and stop making updates to their software.
Extended Description

A System-on-Chip (SoC) often implements a security identifier mechanism to differentiate what actions are allowed or disallowed when a transaction originates from an entity. However, these mechanisms may be exploitable due to any number of the following:

  • The security identifiers are missing
  • The security identifiers are incorrectly implemented or generated
  • The security identifiers are generated with an obsolete encoding
  • The security identifiers are generated and implemented correctly, but are improperly protected
    • If the security identifiers leveraged by the SoC are missing or misconfigured, an adversary may be able to take advantage of this shortcoming to circumvent the intended access controls. This could result in the adversary gaining unintended access, performing a Denial of Service (DoS), escalating privileges, or spoofing actions from a trusted agent.

Severity :

High

Possibility :

Medium

Type :

Standard
Relationships with other CAPECs

This table shows the other attack patterns and high level categories that are related to this attack pattern.

Prerequisites

This table shows the other attack patterns and high level categories that are related to this attack pattern.

  • Awareness of the hardware being leveraged.
  • Access to the hardware being leveraged, either physically or remotely.
Skills required

This table shows the other attack patterns and high level categories that are related to this attack pattern.

  • Medium Knowledge of various wireless protocols to enable remote access to vulnerable devices
  • High Ability to identify physical entry points such as debug interfaces if the device is not being accessed remotely
Taxonomy mappings

Mappings to ATT&CK, OWASP and other frameworks.

Related CWE

A Related Weakness relationship associates a weakness with this attack pattern. Each association implies a weakness that must exist for a given attack to be successful.

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