# CVE-2021-21253: Use of a One-Way Hash without a Salt in OnlineVotingSystem

> Attackers can crack user passwords using rainbow tables because the voting system hashes passwords without a salt, compromising user accounts.

- **Severity:** Medium 5.8 (`CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:L/I:N/A:N`)
- **Exploited in the wild:** Not known
- **Login needed:** Not needed
- **Attackable:** Over the internet
- **Victim action needed:** Not needed
- **Fix available:** No
- **Published:** 21 Jan 2021
- **Updated:** 3 Aug 2024
- **Also known as:** GHSA-wwg8-372v-v332

## What is CVE-2021-21253?

CVE-2021-21253 is a medium-severity vulnerability in dbijaya OnlineVotingSystem, published on 21 Jan 2021. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.

### Official description

OnlineVotingSystem is an open source project hosted on GitHub. OnlineVotingSystem before version 1.1.2 hashes user passwords without a salt, which is vulnerable to dictionary attacks. Therefore there is a threat of security breach in the voting system. Without a salt, it is much easier for attackers to pre-compute the hash value using dictionary attack techniques such as rainbow tables to crack passwords. This problem is fixed and published in version 1.1.2. A long randomly generated salt is added to the password hash function to better protect passwords stored in the voting system.

Weakness: CWE-916 (Use of Password Hash With Insufficient Computational Effort), CWE-759 (Use of a One-Way Hash without a Salt)

## Which versions are affected by CVE-2021-21253?

It affects 1 product.


Products: Onlinevotingsystem Project Onlinevotingsystem.

## How do I fix CVE-2021-21253?

No fix has been published for CVE-2021-21253 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

## Is CVE-2021-21253 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2021-21253 in the wild and no public exploit code.

## Fix prompt for AI coding agents

```text
Check this codebase for CVE-2021-21253 and fix it if it is affected.

What it is: CVE-2021-21253 is a medium-severity vulnerability in dbijaya OnlineVotingSystem, published on 21 Jan 2021. An attacker can exploit it over the internet without logging in, with no action from the victim.
Exploitation: There is no known exploitation of CVE-2021-21253 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Affected product: dbijaya OnlineVotingSystem. No package-level version data is available, so check the vendor advisory linked from the reference page.

Task:
1. Search the dependency manifests and lockfiles (for example package.json, package-lock.json, requirements.txt, poetry.lock, uv.lock, pom.xml, build.gradle, go.mod, Cargo.lock, Gemfile.lock) and any Dockerfiles for the affected packages, including transitive dependencies.
2. If an affected version is in use, upgrade it to the fixed version for its release line with the project's package manager, so the lockfile is regenerated. Prefer the smallest upgrade that fixes it.
3. If there is no fix, or the upgrade would break the build, do not guess: explain the risk and the safest workaround instead.
4. Run the tests and summarise what changed and why.
5. If nothing in the project is affected, say so and change nothing.

Reference: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-21253/ (Markdown: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-21253/index.md)
```

## Sources

- CVE record: https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2021-21253
- NVD: https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2021-21253
- OSV: https://osv.dev/vulnerability/CVE-2021-21253

---
From sbomify Insights: https://insights.sbomify.com/CVE-2021-21253/
Summaries are generated and may contain mistakes; the official description above is the record.