Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling vulnerability in Erlang/OTP inets httpd allows an unauthenticated remote attacker to cause denial of service by opening and holding open a large number of connections. The max_clients option is documented to default to 150, and the inets hardening guide presents that limit as the first layer of denial-of-service defence, but a server that does not set it explicitly accepts an unlimited number of simultaneous connections. Establishing the connections is sufficient; no valid request and no authentication are required. The accept gate in httpd_manager:handle_new_connection/4 reads the option with httpd_util:lookup/2, which returns undefined when the key is absent, rather than the three-argument form carrying the 150 default that the neighbouring get_ustate/2 uses. Erlang term ordering places every integer before every atom, so the Count =< Max guard holds for any connection count and the server never returns {reject, busy}. Each accepted connection occupies a worker process and a socket for as long as it is held, driving the node towards process, memory and file descriptor exhaustion. Servers that set max_clients explicitly are unaffected, because a configured value is applied as intended. This issue affects OTP from OTPÂ 17.0 before OTPÂ 27.3.4.17, from OTPÂ 28.0 before OTPÂ 28.5.0.6, and from OTPÂ 29.0 before OTPÂ 29.0.6, corresponding to inets from 5.10 before 9.3.2.7, from 9.4 before 9.6.2.3, and from 9.7 before 9.7.2.
| Métrique | Valeur | Interprétation |
|---|---|---|
|
AV (Vecteur d'Attaque)
Attack Vector
|
Network (N)
|
Exploit possible à distance via réseau (HTTP, API, etc.) |
|
AC (Complexité d'Attaque)
Attack Complexity
|
Low (L)
|
Peu de conditions requises pour exploiter |
|
PR (Privilèges Requis)
Privileges Required
|
None (N)
|
Aucune authentification requise |
|
UI (Interaction Utilisateur)
User Interaction
|
None (N)
|
Aucune interaction utilisateur nécessaire |
|
S (Périmètre)
Scope
|
Unchanged (U)
|
Impact reste dans le périmètre du composant compromis |
|
C (Impact Confidentialité)
Confidentiality Impact
|
None (N)
|
Aucune divulgation d'informations |
|
I (Impact Intégrité)
Integrity Impact
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None (N)
|
Aucune modification de données possible |
|
A (Impact Disponibilité)
Availability Impact
|
High (H)
|
Interruption totale du service possible |
httpd does not enforce the documented default max_clients connection limit