CVE-2022-2053

moderate-risk
Published 2022-08-05

When a POST request comes through AJP and the request exceeds the max-post-size limit (maxEntitySize), Undertow's AjpServerRequestConduit implementation closes a connection without sending any response to the client/proxy. This behavior results in that a front-end proxy marking the backend worker (application server) as an error state and not forward requests to the worker for a while. In mod_cluster, this continues until the next STATUS request (10 seconds intervals) from the application server updates the server state. So, in the worst case, it can result in "All workers are in error state" and mod_cluster responds "503 Service Unavailable" for a while (up to 10 seconds). In mod_proxy_balancer, it does not forward requests to the worker until the "retry" timeout passes. However, luckily, mod_proxy_balancer has "forcerecovery" setting (On by default; this parameter can force the immediate recovery of all workers without considering the retry parameter of the workers if all workers of a balancer are in error state.). So, unlike mod_cluster, mod_proxy_balancer does not result in responding "503 Service Unavailable". An attacker could use this behavior to send a malicious request and trigger server errors, resulting in DoS (denial of service). This flaw was fixed in Undertow 2.2.19.Final, Undertow 2.3.0.Alpha2.

Do I need to act?

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0.30% chance of exploitation
EPSS score — low exploit probability
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Not on CISA KEV list
No confirmed active exploitation reported to CISA
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Patch status unknown
Check vendor advisories for fix availability and mitigation guidance
7
CVSS 7.5/10 High
NETWORK / LOW complexity

Affected Vendors

37
/ 100
moderate-risk
Severity 26/34 · High
Exploitability 1/34 · Minimal
Exposure 10/34 · Low