CWE-1320

Improper Protection for Outbound Error Messages and Alert Signals
AI Translation Available

Untrusted agents can disable alerts about signal conditions exceeding limits or the response mechanism that handles such alerts.

Status
draft
Abstraction
base
Memory Hardware Microcontroller Hardware Power Management Hardware Processor Hardware Sensor Hardware System on Chip Test/Debug Hardware

Hardware sensors are used to detect whether a device is operating within design limits. The threshold values for these limits are set by hardware fuses or trusted software such as a BIOS. Modification of these limits may be protected by hardware mechanisms.

When device sensors detect out of bound conditions, alert signals may be generated for remedial action, which may take the form of device shutdown or throttling.

Warning signals that are not properly secured may be disabled or used to generate spurious alerts, causing degraded performance or denial-of-service (DoS). These alerts may be masked by untrusted software. Examples of these alerts involve thermal and power sensor alerts.

Common Consequences

availability
Impacts
dos: instability dos: crash, exit, or restart reduce reliability unexpected state

Potential Mitigations

Phases:
architecture and design
Descriptions:
• Alert signals generated by critical events should be protected from access by untrusted agents. Only hardware or trusted firmware modules should be able to alter the alert configuration.