CVE-2017-16763: Confire Unsafe Deserialization Vulnerability

CRITICAL
Advisory Identifier: GHSA-m85c-9mf8-m2m6
Share
CVSS 9.8
Published
Advisory Summary

CVE-2017-16763 is a CRITICAL (CVSS 9.8) unsafe deserialization vulnerability (General Security Weakness) affecting Confire libraries in the PyPI ecosystem. The issue involves unsafe deserialization in confire. Remediation is available in the latest vendor maintenance releases.

CVE-2017-16763 at a Glance

CVE Identifier CVE-2017-16763
GHSA Identifier GHSA-m85c-9mf8-m2m6
Severity CRITICAL
CVSS v3.1 Base Score 9.8
CWE Classification General Security Weakness
Affected Product Confire
Package Ecosystem PyPI
Published Date
Last Updated

Security Impact

CVSS: 9.8

The security impact metrics below are parsed directly from the CVSS v3.1 vector string (CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H).

Attack Vector Network (AV:N)
Attack Complexity Low (AC:L)
Privileges Required None (PR:N)
User Interaction None (UI:N)
Scope Unchanged (S:U)
Confidentiality High (C:H)
Integrity High (I:H)
Availability High (A:H)

How to Fix CVE-2017-16763

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

confire fixed: Latest secure release 
pip install confire>=Latest secure release
Verify Direct and Transitive Dependencies

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

pip show confire

How to Check if You Are Affected

To determine whether your Python environment is affected by CVE-2017-16763, inspect your installed packages using pip:

pip show confire

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

Note: The pip show confire command checks currently installed packages in your active Python environment.

Technical Details

Vulnerability Mechanism & Technical Analysis

This vulnerability is classified under General Security Weakness. In Confire, 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

An exploitable vulnerability exists in the YAML parsing functionality in config.py in Confire 0.2.0. Due to the user-specific configuration being loaded from "~/.confire.yaml" using the yaml.load function, a YAML parser can execute arbitrary Python commands resulting in command execution. An attacker can insert Python into loaded YAML to trigger this vulnerability.

CVE-2017-16763 Affected Confire Versions

1 component(s)
Product / Package Ecosystem Affected Versions Fixed Version
confire
pypi/confire
PyPI
≤ 0.2.0

References

NVD — CVE-2017-16763 NVD
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2017-16763
Confire Source Repository REPOSITORY
https://github.com/bbengfort/confire/issues/24
Security Fix Commit FIX COMMIT
https://github.com/bbengfort/confire/commit/8cc86a5ec2327e070f1d576d61bbaadf861597ea
GitHub Advisory / Wiki ADVISORY
https://github.com/advisories/GHSA-m85c-9mf8-m2m6
Confire Source Repository REPOSITORY
https://github.com/bbengfort/confire
Confire Source Repository REPOSITORY
https://github.com/pypa/advisory-database/tree/main/vulns/confire/PYSEC-2017-78.yaml
joel-malwarebenchmark.github.io/blog/2017/11/12/cve... WEB
https://joel-malwarebenchmark.github.io/blog/2017/11/12/cve-2017-16763-configure-loaded-through-confire

Frequently Asked Questions

What is CVE-2017-16763?
CVE-2017-16763 is a security vulnerability in Confire involving Unsafe deserialization in confire under General Security Weakness.
Which Confire versions are affected?
Affected versions include releases prior to current release patches across affected packages: confire.
What version fixes CVE-2017-16763?
Upgrading to current release patches (or the latest patched release for your respective branch) resolves the vulnerability.
Is confire affected?
Yes, confire is affected in releases prior to Latest secure release. Upgrade your dependency to Latest secure release or later.
What is the CVSS score of CVE-2017-16763?
CVE-2017-16763 has a CVSS v3.1 base score of 9.8 (CRITICAL) with vector string CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H.
What CWE is associated with CVE-2017-16763?
CVE-2017-16763 is classified under General Security Weakness.
How can I check PyPI dependencies for CVE-2017-16763?
Run the dependency tree command: 'pip show confire'. 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
View Raw JSON 
{
  "schema_version" : "1.4.0",
  "id" : "GHSA-m85c-9mf8-m2m6",
  "modified" : "2024-09-13T18:29:06Z",
  "published" : "2018-07-18T18:28:26Z",
  "aliases" : [ "CVE-2017-16763" ],
  "summary" : "Unsafe deserialization in confire",
  "details" : "An exploitable vulnerability exists in the YAML parsing functionality in config.py in Confire 0.2.0. Due to the user-specific configuration being loaded from \"~/.confire.yaml\" using the yaml.load function, a YAML parser can execute arbitrary Python commands resulting in command execution. An attacker can insert Python into loaded YAML to trigger this vulnerability.",
  "severity" : [ {
    "type" : "CVSS_V3",
    "score" : "CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H"
  }, {
    "type" : "CVSS_V4",
    "score" : "CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:N/PR:N/UI:N/VC:H/VI:H/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N"
  } ],
  "affected" : [ {
    "package" : {
      "ecosystem" : "PyPI",
      "name" : "confire"
    },
    "ranges" : [ {
      "type" : "ECOSYSTEM",
      "events" : [ {
        "introduced" : "0"
      }, {
        "last_affected" : "0.2.0"
      } ]
    } ]
  } ],
  "references" : [ {
    "type" : "ADVISORY",
    "url" : "https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2017-16763"
  }, {
    "type" : "WEB",
    "url" : "https://github.com/bbengfort/confire/issues/24"
  }, {
    "type" : "WEB",
    "url" : "https://github.com/bbengfort/confire/commit/8cc86a5ec2327e070f1d576d61bbaadf861597ea"
  }, {
    "type" : "ADVISORY",
    "url" : "https://github.com/advisories/GHSA-m85c-9mf8-m2m6"
  }, {
    "type" : "PACKAGE",
    "url" : "https://github.com/bbengfort/confire"
  }, {
    "type" : "WEB",
    "url" : "https://github.com/pypa/advisory-database/tree/main/vulns/confire/PYSEC-2017-78.yaml"
  }, {
    "type" : "WEB",
    "url" : "https://joel-malwarebenchmark.github.io/blog/2017/11/12/cve-2017-16763-configure-loaded-through-confire"
  } ],
  "database_specific" : {
    "cwe_ids" : [ ],
    "severity" : "CRITICAL",
    "github_reviewed" : true,
    "github_reviewed_at" : "2020-06-16T21:45:21Z",
    "nvd_published_at" : null
  }
}