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EmbedThis GoAhead Web Server 5.1.1 Digest Authentication Capture Replay Nonce Reuse

Medium
Advisory ID
ZSL-2020-5598
Release Date
06 October 2020
Vendor
Embedthis Software LLC - https://www.embedthis.com
Affected Version
<=5.1.1 and <=4.1.2
Tested On
GoAhead-http, GoAhead-Webs
Summary

GoAhead is the world's most popular, tiny embedded web server. It is compact, secure and simple to use. GoAhead is deployed in hundreds of millions of devices and is ideal for the smallest of embedded devices.

Description

A security vulnerability affecting GoAhead versions 2 to 5 has been identified when using Digest authentication over HTTP. The HTTP Digest Authentication in the GoAhead web server does not completely protect against replay attacks. This allows an unauthenticated remote attacker to bypass authentication via capture-replay if TLS is not used to protect the underlying communication channel. Digest authentication uses a "nonce" value to mitigate replay attacks. GoAhead versions 3 to 5 validated the nonce with a fixed duration of 5 minutes which permitted short-period replays. This duration is too long for most implementations.

Proof of Concept
Disclosure Timeline
16.07.2020Vendor releases version 4.1.4 or 5.1.2 to address this issue.
Credits
Vulnerability discovered by Gjoko Krstic
High five to David and Michael.
References
Changelog
06.10.2020Initial release
18.10.2020Added reference [8], [9] and [10]
04.11.2020Added reference [11]