Wrong type for `Linker`-define functions when used across two `Engine`s (bytecodealliance wasmtime)

CVE-2021-39219
MEDIUM 6.3

At a glance

Source
NVD
EPSS
EPSS 0.36 % · percentile 30 ()
State
PUBLISHED
Published
Updated
Assigner
GitHub_M
NVD status
Modified

Description

Wasmtime is an open source runtime for WebAssembly & WASI. Wasmtime before version 0.30.0 is affected by a type confusion vulnerability. As a Rust library the `wasmtime` crate clearly marks which functions are safe and which are `unsafe`, guaranteeing that if consumers never use `unsafe` then it should not be possible to have memory unsafety issues in their embeddings of Wasmtime. An issue was discovered in the safe API of `Linker::func_*` APIs. These APIs were previously not sound when one `Engine` was used to create the `Linker` and then a different `Engine` was used to create a `Store` and then the `Linker` was used to instantiate a module into that `Store`. Cross-`Engine` usage of functions is not supported in Wasmtime and this can result in type confusion of function pointers, resulting in being able to safely call a function with the wrong type. Triggering this bug requires using at least two `Engine` values in an embedding and then additionally using two different values with a `Linker` (one at the creation time of the `Linker` and another when instantiating a module with the `Linker`). It's expected that usage of more-than-one `Engine` in an embedding is relatively rare since an `Engine` is intended to be a globally shared resource, so the expectation is that the impact of this issue is relatively small. The fix implemented is to change this behavior to `panic!()` in Rust instead of silently allowing it. Using different `Engine` instances with a `Linker` is a programmer bug that `wasmtime` catches at runtime. This bug has been patched and users should upgrade to Wasmtime version 0.30.0. If you cannot upgrade Wasmtime and are using more than one `Engine` in your embedding it's recommended to instead use only one `Engine` for the entire program if possible. An `Engine` is designed to be a globally shared resource that is suitable to have only one for the lifetime of an entire process. If using multiple `Engine`s is required then code should be audited to ensure that `Linker` is only used with one `Engine`.

Weaknesses (CWE)

  • CWE-843 — Access of Resource Using Incompatible Type

References

Scores

VersionScoreVectorScored by
CVSS 3.1MEDIUM 6.3CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:HGitHub_M
CVSS 3.1MEDIUM 6.3CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:HNVD · security-advisories@github.com (Secondary)
CVSS 3.1MEDIUM 6.3CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:HNVD · nvd@nist.gov (Primary)
CVSS 2.0LOW 3.3AV:L/AC:M/Au:N/C:N/I:P/A:PNVD · nvd@nist.gov (Primary)

Advisories

European references

Affected configurations (NVD CPE)

Affected products

ProductVersions
bytecodealliance · wasmtimeaffected <= 0.29.0

Sources

SourceLicence
CVE List (CVEProject cvelistV5)CVE Program Terms of Use
EPSS (FIRST.org)FIRST — attribution requested
ENISA EUVDENISA — reproduction authorised, source acknowledged
NVD (NIST) via fkie-cad/nvd-json-data-feedsPublic domain — this product uses data from the NVD API but is not endorsed or certified by the NVD