GitHub Advisoryadvisory · crates.io
GHSA-wvc4-j7g5-4f79 NATS TLS certificate common name validation bypass
MEDIUM
Official page ↗
- Ecosystem
- crates.io
- Packages
- nats
- Severity
- Moderate
- Weaknesses
- CWE-347
- Reviewed
- 2023-03-27
Affected packages
• crates.io nats: >= 0.9.0, < 0.24.1 → fixed in 0.24.1
Description
The NATS official Rust clients are vulnerable to MitM when using TLS.
A fix for the `nats` crate hasn't been released yet. Since the `nats` crate is going to be deprecated anyway, consider switching to `async-nats` `>= 0.29` which already fixed this vulnerability.
The common name of the server's TLS certificate is validated against the `host`name provided by the server's plaintext `INFO` message during the initial connection setup phase. A MitM proxy can tamper with the `host` field's value by substituting it with the common name of a valid certificate it controls, fooling the client into accepting it.
Reproduction steps
1. The NATS Rust client tries to establish a new connection
2. The connection is intercepted by a MitM proxy
3. The proxy makes a separate connection to the NATS server
4. The NATS server replies with an `INFO` message
5. The proxy reads the `INFO`, alters the `host` JSON field and passes the tampered `INFO` back to the client
6. The proxy upgrades the client connection to TLS, presenting a certificate issued by a certificate authority present in the client's keychain. In the previous step the `host` was set to the common name of said certificate
7. `rustls` accepts the certificate, having verified that the common name matches the attacker-controlled value it was given
9. The client has been fooled by the MitM proxy into accepting the attacker-controlled certificate
Related
Weakness · CWE (1)
- CWE-347 Improper Verification of Cryptographic Signature weakness