CVE-2023-6245

HIGH

Candid - DoS

Title source: llm
STIX 2.1

Description

The Candid library causes a Denial of Service while parsing a specially crafted payload with 'empty' data type. For example, if the payload is `record { * ; empty }` and the canister interface expects `record { * }` then the Rust candid decoder treats empty as an extra field required by the type. The problem with the type empty is that the candid Rust library wrongly categorizes empty as a recoverable error when skipping the field and thus causing an infinite decoding loop. Canisters using affected versions of candid are exposed to denial of service by causing the decoding to run indefinitely until the canister traps due to reaching maximum instruction limit per execution round. Repeated exposure to the payload will result in degraded performance of the canister. Note: Canisters written in Motoko are unaffected.

Scores

CVSS v3 7.5
EPSS 0.0013
EPSS Percentile 32.1%
Attack Vector NETWORK
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

CISA SSVC

Vulnrichment
Exploitation none
Automatable yes
Technical Impact partial

Details

CWE
CWE-1288 CWE-20 CWE-168 CWE-835
Status published
Products (2)
crates.io/candid 0.9.0 - 0.9.10crates.io
dfinity/candid 0.9.0 - 0.9.10
Published Dec 08, 2023
Tracked Since Feb 18, 2026