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Inconsistent Interpretation of HTTP Requests ('HTTP Request/Response Smuggling')

CVE-2021-45468

High
9.8/10

Summary

Imperva Web Application Firewall (WAF) before 2021-12-23 allows remote unauthenticated attackers to use "Content-Encoding: gzip" to evade WAF security controls and send malicious HTTP POST requests to web servers behind the WAF.

  • LOW
  • NETWORK
  • HIGH
  • UNCHANGED
  • NONE
  • NONE
  • HIGH
  • HIGH

CWE-444 - HTTP Request Smuggling

Entities such as web servers, web caching proxies, and application firewalls could parse HTTP requests differently. When there are two or more such entities in the path of an HTTP request, an attacker can send a specially crafted HTTP request that is seen as two different sets of requests by the attacked devices, allowing the attacker to smuggle a request into one device without the other device being aware of it. Such a vulnerability can prove devastating, for it enables further attacks on the application, like web cache poisoning, session hijacking, cross-site scripting, security bypassing, and sensitive information exposure.

References

Advisory Timeline

  • Published