GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m: Sp1 stark SP1 Has Missing Verifier Checks Vulnerability

HIGH
Published
Advisory Summary

GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m is a HIGH sp1 has missing verifier checks vulnerability (General Security Weakness) affecting Sp1 stark libraries in the crates.io ecosystem. The issue involves sp1 has missing verifier checks and fiat-shamir observations. Remediation is available by upgrading affected packages to version 4.0.0.

GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m at a Glance

CVE Identifier N/A
GHSA Identifier GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m
Severity HIGH
CVSS v3.1 Base Score N/A
CWE Classification General Security Weakness
Affected Product Sp1 stark
Package Ecosystem crates.io
Published Date
Last Updated

How to Fix GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m

To remediate this vulnerability, upgrade all affected Sp1 stark dependencies to a patched release. Both direct and transitive dependencies should be checked, as frameworks or security libraries may pull in vulnerable versions transitively.

sp1-stark fixed: 4.0.0
Upgrade sp1-stark to 4.0.0
Verify Direct and Transitive Dependencies

Run the following command in your project directory to verify that all resolved dependencies use the patched release:

inspect dependencies for sp1-stark

How to Check if You Are Affected

To determine whether your application is affected by GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m, inspect your project dependencies for Sp1 stark:

inspect dependencies for sp1-stark

Analyze the terminal output to locate any version of Sp1 stark in your dependency tree. If any resolved version matches the vulnerable ranges listed in the table below (for example, versions earlier than 4.0.0), your application is affected.

Note: Verify declared build manifests and deployed runtime container environments.

Technical Details

Vulnerability Mechanism & Technical Analysis

This vulnerability is classified under General Security Weakness. In Sp1 stark, software state validation or input boundaries are circumvented during processing. Review the official source advisory statement below for specific affected components, classes, and reproduction details.

Source Advisory Statement

In SP1’s STARK verifier, the prover provided `chip_ordering` is used to fetch the index of the chips that have preprocessed columns. Prior to v4.0.0, the validation that this `chip_ordering` correctly provides these indexes was missing. In v4.0.0, this was fixed by adding a check that the indexed chip’s name is equal to the name stored in the verifying key’s chip information. In the recursive verifier, every verifier program is generated beforehand and later checked for correctness by requiring a merkle proof to the precomputed merkle root of valid verifier keys. Therefore, the recursive verifier and the on-chain verifier were not affected by this vulnerability. This code was audited twice, once as a part of the audit by KALOS and once by Cantina for v1.0.0. This bug was found by the Succinct team during preparation of v4.0.0. Out of abundance of caution, we will be deprecating all previous versions and freeze the corresponding verifiers. Furthermore, in the recursive verifier, the `is_complete` boolean flag is used to flag a proof of complete execution. Prior to v4.0.0, this flag was underconstrained in parts of our recursive verifier, such as the first layer of the recursion. In v4.0.0, this bug was fixed by adding appropriate calls to the `assert_complete` function, which constrains the correctness of the `is_complete` flag. This code was a part of the audit for v3.0.0. This bug affects the soundness of the Rust SDK for verifying compressed proofs, and the soundness of on-chain verifier for deferred proofs. This issue was found by a combined effort from Aligned, LambdaClass and 3MI Labs, and was also independently found by Succinct during the preparation of v4.0.0. Lastly, SP1’s STARK verifier relied on logic inside Plonky3, one SP1's core dependencies, to check that the polynomial evaluation claims are correct using a FRI-based polynomial commitment scheme. To batch this check, multiple polynomial evaluation claims are combined using a random linear combination. Prior to v4.0.0, the individual evaluation claims were not observed into the challenger before sampling the coefficient for the random linear combination. In v4.0.0, this was fixed by observing all the evaluation claims into the challenger correctly inside of Plonky3. This bug was found by Lev Soukhanov and Onur Kilic, and we have worked closely with the Plonky3 team to mitigate this vulnerability. We will be deprecating all previous versions and freezing their verifiers to ensure that versions with the vulnerability will not be used in production.

GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m Affected Sp1 stark Versions

1 component(s)
Fixed Versions:
4.0.0
Product / Package Ecosystem Affected Versions Fixed Version
sp1-stark
crates.io
< 4.0.0
4.0.0

References

Frequently Asked Questions

What is GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m?
GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m is a security vulnerability in Sp1 stark involving SP1 has missing verifier checks and fiat-shamir observations under General Security Weakness.
Which Sp1 stark versions are affected?
Affected versions include releases prior to 4.0.0 across affected packages: sp1-stark.
What version fixes GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m?
Upgrading to 4.0.0 (or the latest patched release for your respective branch) resolves the vulnerability.
Is sp1-stark affected?
Yes, sp1-stark is affected in releases prior to 4.0.0. Upgrade your dependency to 4.0.0 or later.
What CWE is associated with GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m?
GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m is classified under General Security Weakness.
How can I check crates.io dependencies for GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m?
Run the dependency tree command: 'inspect dependencies for sp1-stark'. This command lists direct and transitive dependencies in your build configuration so you can verify if a vulnerable version is resolved.
Machine-readable OSV JSON OSV v1.5 Schema
Normalized schema output
{
  "schema_version" : "1.4.0",
  "id" : "GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m",
  "modified" : "2025-01-28T02:03:05Z",
  "published" : "2025-01-15T21:25:54Z",
  "aliases" : [ ],
  "summary" : " SP1 has missing verifier checks and fiat-shamir observations",
  "details" : "In SP1’s STARK verifier, the prover provided `chip_ordering` is used to fetch the index of the chips that have preprocessed columns. Prior to v4.0.0, the validation that this `chip_ordering` correctly provides these indexes was missing. In v4.0.0, this was fixed by adding a check that the indexed chip’s name is equal to the name stored in the verifying key’s chip information. \n\nIn the recursive verifier, every verifier program is generated beforehand and later checked for correctness by requiring a merkle proof to the precomputed merkle root of valid verifier keys. Therefore, the recursive verifier and the on-chain verifier were not affected by this vulnerability. \n\nThis code was audited twice, once as a part of the audit by KALOS and once by Cantina for v1.0.0. This bug was found by the Succinct team during preparation of v4.0.0. Out of abundance of caution, we will be deprecating all previous versions and freeze the corresponding verifiers.\n\nFurthermore, in the recursive verifier, the `is_complete` boolean flag is used to flag a proof of complete execution. Prior to v4.0.0, this flag was underconstrained in parts of our recursive verifier, such as the first layer of the recursion. In v4.0.0, this bug was fixed by adding appropriate calls to the `assert_complete` function, which constrains the correctness of the `is_complete` flag. This code was a part of the audit for v3.0.0. This bug affects the soundness of the Rust SDK for verifying compressed proofs, and the soundness of on-chain verifier for deferred proofs. \n\nThis issue was found by a combined effort from Aligned, LambdaClass and 3MI Labs, and was also independently found by Succinct during the preparation of v4.0.0. \n\nLastly, SP1’s STARK verifier relied on logic inside Plonky3, one SP1's core dependencies, to check that the polynomial evaluation claims are correct using a FRI-based polynomial commitment scheme. To batch this check, multiple polynomial evaluation claims are combined using a random linear combination. Prior to v4.0.0, the individual evaluation claims were not observed into the challenger before sampling the coefficient for the random linear combination. In v4.0.0, this was fixed by observing all the evaluation claims into the challenger correctly inside of Plonky3.\n\nThis bug was found by Lev Soukhanov and Onur Kilic, and we have worked closely with the Plonky3 team to mitigate this vulnerability. We will be deprecating all previous versions and freezing their verifiers to ensure that versions with the vulnerability will not be used in production.",
  "severity" : [ ],
  "affected" : [ {
    "package" : {
      "ecosystem" : "crates.io",
      "name" : "sp1-stark"
    },
    "ranges" : [ {
      "type" : "ECOSYSTEM",
      "events" : [ {
        "introduced" : "0"
      }, {
        "fixed" : "4.0.0"
      } ]
    } ]
  } ],
  "references" : [ {
    "type" : "WEB",
    "url" : "https://github.com/succinctlabs/sp1/security/advisories/GHSA-c873-wfhp-wx5m"
  }, {
    "type" : "PACKAGE",
    "url" : "https://github.com/succinctlabs/sp1"
  } ],
  "database_specific" : {
    "cwe_ids" : [ ],
    "severity" : "HIGH",
    "github_reviewed" : true,
    "github_reviewed_at" : "2025-01-15T21:25:54Z",
    "nvd_published_at" : null
  }
}