CVE-2020-27196 Out-of-bounds Write in Play Framework

What is CVE-2020-27196?

CVE-2020-27196 is a high-severity denial of service vulnerability in n/a, published on 6 Nov 2020. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

Official description

An issue was discovered in PlayJava in Play Framework 2.6.0 through 2.8.2. The body parsing of HTTP requests eagerly parses a payload given a Content-Type header. A deep JSON structure sent to a valid POST endpoint (that may or may not expect JSON payloads) causes a StackOverflowError and Denial of Service.

Weakness: CWE-787

Which versions are affected by CVE-2020-27196?

8 open source packages ship an affected version, including com.typesafe.play:play and com.typesafe.play:play-java. It affects 1 product.

Products include Lightbend Play Framework.

How do I fix CVE-2020-27196?

Upgrade com.typesafe.play:play to a fixed version for your release line: 2.7.6 or 2.8.3.

Upgrade, then put limits on request size, rate and nesting depth so one client cannot exhaust the service. More about Denial of service.

Is CVE-2020-27196 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2020-27196 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Other vulnerabilities in n/a

• CVE-2014-3630 XML external entity in n/a Critical 9.8
• CVE-2022-31018 Denial of service binding form from JSON in Play Framework High 7.5
• CVE-2020-26882 Data Amplification in Play Framework High 7.5
• CVE-2020-26883 Uncontrolled Recursion in Play Framework High 7.5
• CVE-2019-17598 Play Framework Inadequate Encryption Strength vulnerability High 7.5

Sources

• CVE record
• NVD
• OSV
• GitHub advisory
• How this page is made

Also known as GHSA-h48w-c35p-6m8x.