File Handling Issues

A category in the Common Weakness Enumeration published by The MITRE Corporation.


Summary

Categories in the Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE) group entries based on some common characteristic or attribute.

Weaknesses in this category are related to the handling of files within a software system. Files, directories, and folders are so central to information technology that many different weaknesses and variants have been discovered.

Weaknesses

Creation of Temporary File in Directory with Insecure Permissions

The product creates a temporary file in a directory whose permissions allow unintended actors to determine the file's existence or otherwise access that file.

Creation of Temporary File With Insecure Permissions

Opening temporary files without appropriate measures or controls can leave the file, its contents and any function that it impacts vulnerable to attack.

Improper Handling of File Names that Identify Virtual Resources

The product does not handle or incorrectly handles a file name that identifies a "virtual" resource that is not directly specified within the directory that is associa...

Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory ('Path Traversal')

The product uses external input to construct a pathname that is intended to identify a file or directory that is located underneath a restricted parent directory, but ...

Improper Link Resolution Before File Access ('Link Following')

The product attempts to access a file based on the filename, but it does not properly prevent that filename from identifying a link or shortcut that resolves to an uni...

Improper Resolution of Path Equivalence

The product is vulnerable to file system contents disclosure through path equivalence. Path equivalence involves the use of special characters in file and directory na...

Uncontrolled Search Path Element

The product uses a fixed or controlled search path to find resources, but one or more locations in that path can be under the control of unintended actors.

Unquoted Search Path or Element

The product uses a search path that contains an unquoted element, in which the element contains whitespace or other separators. This can cause the product to access re...

Untrusted Search Path

The product searches for critical resources using an externally-supplied search path that can point to resources that are not under the product's direct control.

Concepts

Software Development

This view organizes weaknesses around concepts that are frequently used or encountered in software development. This includes all aspects of the software development l...


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