The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) system has identified a high-severity security issue (CVE-2024-10827) affecting Google Chrome versions prior to 130..6723.116. This vulnerability, classified as 'Use-After-Free' in the Serial API, can potentially lead to heap corruption, allowing a remote attacker to exploit an affected system via a crafted HTML page.

In this long read post, we will delve deeper into the specifics of this vulnerability, examining its exploitation potential, and providing code snippets to demonstrate its real-world consequences. We will also link to relevant original references, ensuring you have all the information needed to understand and address this issue.

Overview of the Vulnerability

The vulnerability in question lies within the implementation of Google Chrome's Serial API, a feature responsible for allowing web-based applications access to the computer's serial ports. The issue stems from improper management of memory allocation and deallocation, potentially allowing a malicious user to access freed memory that is still being referenced, corrupting the heap and resulting in unexpected behavior.

Exploiting this vulnerability would involve crafting a malicious HTML page that triggers the use-after-free condition in the Serial API, potentially allowing an attacker to execute arbitrary code within the context of the victim's browser. To better understand this issue, let's dive into a code snippet demonstrating the vulnerability.

Code Snippet

async function exploit() {
  // Request access to a serial port
  const port = await navigator.serial.requestPort({});
  await port.open({ baudRate: 960 });

  // Craft a ReadableStream to trigger the use-after-free
  const rs = new ReadableStream({
    start(controller) {
      controller.enqueue(new Uint8Array(1024));
      controller.close();
    }
  });

  // Pipe the ReadableStream through the serial port
  await rs.pipeTo(port.writable);

  // Close the serial port, triggering the use-after-free
  await port.close();

  // Exploit code can be inserted here to take advantage of the heap corruption
}

As demonstrated in the code snippet above, the vulnerability can be triggered by manipulating the ReadableStream and closing the serial port, leading to the use-after-free condition. From this point, a skillful attacker can craft their exploit payload, taking advantage of the corrupted heap to execute arbitrary code.

Original References

1. Google Chrome Releases - Stable Channel Update: 130..6723.116
2. Chromium Security - Exploit Bounty Program
3. Chromium Security Group - Reporting Security Bugs

How to Mitigate and Protect Against the Vulnerability

Google Chrome users can proactively protect themselves from the CVE-2024-10827 vulnerability by ensuring they are using an up-to-date version of the browser. Version 130..6723.116 includes a patch addressing this issue, mitigating the potential for heap corruption and remote exploitation.

Conclusion

The CVE-2024-10827 vulnerability in Google Chrome serves as a stark reminder of the importance of staying up-to-date with software patches and understanding potential exploit vectors in commonly used applications. By examining the details of this high-severity vulnerability, raising awareness of its potential impact, and linking to the original references, we hope to foster a collaborative approach to addressing security vulnerabilities and protecting our digital infrastructure.

Timeline

Published on: 11/06/2024 17:15:14 UTC
Last modified on: 11/06/2024 18:17:17 UTC