JSON Hijacking (aka JavaScript Hijacking) |
| Attack Pattern ID: 111 (Detailed Attack Pattern Completeness: Complete) | Typical Severity: High | Status: Draft |
DescriptionSummary
An attacker targets a system that uses JavaScript Object Notation (JSON) as a transport mechanism between the client and the server (common in Web 2.0 systems using AJAX) to steal possibly confidential information transmitted from the server back to the client inside the JSON object by taking advantage of the loophole in the browser's Single Origin Policy that does not prohibit JavaScript from one website to be included and executed in the context of another website.
An attacker gets the victim to visit his or her malicious page that contains a script tag whose source points to the vulnerable system with a URL that requests a response from the server containing a JSON object with possibly confidential information. The malicious page also contains malicious code to capture the JSON object returned by the server before any other processing on it can take place, typically by overriding the JavaScript function used to create new objects. This hook allows the malicious code to get access to the creation of each object and transmit the possibly sensitive contents of the captured JSON object to the attacker's server.
There is nothing in the browser's security model to prevent the attacker's malicious JavaScript code (originating from attacker's domain) to set up an environment (as described above) to intercept a JSON object response (coming from the vulnerable target system's domain), read its contents and transmit to the attacker's controlled site. The single origin policy protects the domain object model (DOM), but not the JSON.
Attack Execution Flow
Understand How to Request JSON Responses from the Target System:
An attacker first explores the target system to understand what URLs need to be provided to it in order to retrieve JSON objects that contain information of interest to the attacker.
Attack Step Techniques
ID Attack Step Technique Description Environments 1 An attacker creates an account with the target system and observes requests and the corresponding JSON responses from the server. Understanding how to properly elicit responses from the server is crucial to the attacker's ability to craft the exploit.
env-WebIndicators
ID type Indicator Description Environments 1 Positive Targeted application leverages JSON in its architecture.
env-Web
Craft a malicious website:
The attacker crafts a malicious website to which he plans to lure the victim who is using the vulnerable target system. The malicious website does two things:
1. Contains a hook that intercepts incoming JSON objects, reads their contents and forwards the contents to the server controlled by the attacker (via a new XMLHttpRequest).
2. Uses the script tag with a URL in the source that requests a JSON object from the vulnerable target system. Once the JSON object is transmitted to the victim's browser, the malicious code (as described in step 1) intercepts that JSON object, steals its contents, and forwards to the attacker.
This attack step leverages the fact that the single origin policy in the browser does not protect JavaScript originating from one domain from setting up an environment to intercept and access JSON objects arriving from a completely different domain.
Outcomes
ID type Outcome Description 1 Success The JSON object hook captures, reads and forwards JSON objects2 Success The malicious website effectively requests JSON objects from the target system
Launch JSON hijack:
An attacker lures the victim to the malicious website or leverages other means to get his malicious code executing in the victim's browser. Once that happens, the malicious code makes a request to the victim target system to retrieve a JSON object with sensitive information. The request includes the victim's session cookie if the victim is logged in.
Attack Step Techniques
ID Attack Step Technique Description Environments 1 An attacker employs a myriad of standard techniques to get the victim to visit his or her malicious site or by some other means get the attacker's malicious code executing in the victim's browser.
env-WebOutcomes
ID type Outcome Description 1 Success The sensitive contents of captured JSON objects are readable by the attacker.
Attack PrerequisitesJSON is used as a transport mechanism between the client and the server
The target server cannot differentiate real requests from forged requests
The JSON object returned from the server can be accessed by the attacker's malicious code via a script tag
Typical Likelihood of ExploitLikelihood: High
Methods of Attack- Protocol Manipulation
- Analysis
- Spoofing
Examples-InstancesDescription
Gmail service was found to be vulnerable to a JSON Hijacking attack that enabled an attacker to get the contents of the victim's address book. An attacker could send an e-mail to the victim's gmail account (which ensures that the victim is logged in to gmail when he or she receives it) with a link to the attacker's malicious site. If the victim clicked on the link, a request (containing the victim's authenticated session cookie) would be sent to the gmail servers to fetch the victim's address book. This functionality is typically used by the Gmail service to get this data on the fly so that the user can be provided a list of contacts from which to choose the recipient of the e-mail.
When the JSON object with the contacts came back, it was loaded into the JavaScript space via a scipt tag on the attacker's malicious page. Since the JSON object was never assigned to a local variable (which would have prevented a scipt from a different domain accessing it due to the browser's single origin policy), another mechanism was needed to access the data that it contained. That mechanism was overwriting the internal array constructor with the attacker's own constructor in order to gain access to the JSON object's contents. These contents could then be transferred to the site controlled by the attacker.
Attacker Skills or Knowledge RequiredSkill or Knowledge Level: Medium
Once this attack pattern is developed and understood, creating an exploit is not very complex.
Resources RequiredNo specialized hardware resources are required. The attacker needs to have knowledge of the URLs that need to be accessed on the target system to request the JSON objects.
Probing TechniquesExamine the typical asynchronous requests and responses between an AJAX client and the server to see how JSON objects are requested and what is returned.
Solutions and MitigationsEnsure that server side code can differentiate between legitimate requests and forged requests. The solution is similar to protection against Cross Site Request Forger (CSRF), which is to use a hard to guess random nonce (that is unique to the victim's session with the server) that the attacker has no way of knowing (at least in the absense of other weaknesses). Each request from the client to the server should contain this nonce and the server should reject all requests that do not contain the nonce.
On the client side, the system's design could make it difficult to get access to the JSON object content via the script tag. Since the JSON object is never assigned locally to a variable, it cannot be readily modified by the attacker before being used by a script tag. For instance, if while(1) was added to the beginning of the JavaScript returned by the server, trying to access it with a script tag would result in an infinite loop. On the other hand, legitimate client side code can remove the while(1) statement after which the JavaScript can be evaluated. A similar result can be achieved by surrounding the returned JavaScript with comment tags, or using other similar techniques (e.g. wrapping the JavaScript with HTML tags).
Make the URLs in the system used to retrieve JSON objects unpredictable and unique for each user session.
Ensure that to the extent possible, no sensitive data is passed from the server to the client via JSON objects. JavaScript was never intended to play that role, hence the single origin policy does not adequate address this scenario.
Attack Motivation-Consequences- Information Leakage
Related Weaknesses Related Attack Patterns| Nature | Type | ID | Name | Description | View(s) this relationship pertains to |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ChildOf |  Attack Pattern | 116 | Data Excavation Attacks | Mechanism of Attack (primary)1000 | |
| ChildOf | Attack Pattern | 184 | Software Integrity Attacks | Mechanism of Attack (primary)1000 |
Relevant Security RequirementsEnsure that a mechanism is in place for the server side code to differentiate between legitimate requests and forged requests
On the client side, ensure that the returned JavaScript from the server can only be evaluated locally after being assigned to a variable and not via a script tag
Ensure that URLs used to request server responses that pass the JSON objects back to the client are hard to guess and are unique per user session
Related GuidelinesDo not pass confidential information in JSON objects
Purposes- Exploitation
CIA Impact Technical Context| Architectural Paradigms | Client-Server |
|---|---|
| Frameworks | All |
| Platforms | All |
| Languages | AJAX |
Content History| Submissions | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Submitter | Organization | Date | Comments | |
| Evgeny Lebanidze | Cigital, Inc | 2008-01-12 | Initial core pattern content | |
| Modifications | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Modifier | Organization | Date | Comments | ||
| Sean Barnum | Cigital Federal, Inc. | 2009-04-20 | Refinement of pattern content | ||
