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OpenSSL: CA Certificate Check Bypass Vulnerability (CVE-2021-3450) - Windows

Information

Severity

Severity

Medium

Family

Family

General

CVSSv2 Base

CVSSv2 Base

6.4

CVSSv2 Vector

CVSSv2 Vector

AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:N

Solution Type

Solution Type

Vendor Patch

Created

Created

3 years ago

Modified

Modified

3 years ago

Summary

OpenSSL is prone to a CA certificate check bypass vulnerability.

Insight

Insight

The X509_V_FLAG_X509_STRICT flag enables additional security checks of the certificates present in a certificate chain. It is not set by default. Starting from OpenSSL version 1.1.1h a check to disallow certificates in the chain that have explicitly encoded elliptic curve parameters was added as an additional strict check. An error in the implementation of this check meant that the result of a previous check to confirm that certificates in the chain are valid CA certificates was overwritten. This effectively bypasses the check that non-CA certificates must not be able to issue other certificates. If a 'purpose' has been configured then there is a subsequent opportunity for checks that the certificate is a valid CA. All of the named 'purpose' values implemented in libcrypto perform this check. Therefore, where a purpose is set the certificate chain will still be rejected even when the strict flag has been used. A purpose is set by default in libssl client and server certificate verification routines, but it can be overridden or removed by an application. In order to be affected, an application must explicitly set the X509_V_FLAG_X509_STRICT verification flag and either not set a purpose for the certificate verification or, in the case of TLS client or server applications, override the default purpose.

Affected Software

Affected Software

OpenSSL version 1.1.1h through 1.1.1j.

Detection Method

Detection Method

Checks if a vulnerable version is present on the target host.

Solution

Solution

Update OpenSSL to version 1.1.1k or later.

Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE)