Detailed attack pattern
Draft
CAPEC-221: Data Serialization External Entities Blowup
This attack takes advantage of the entity replacement property of certain data serialization languages (e.g., XML, YAML, etc.) where the value of the replacement is a URI. A well-crafted file could have the entity refer to a URI that consumes a large amount of resources to create a denial of service condition. This can cause the system to either freeze, crash, or execute arbitrary code depending on the URI.
Not rated
Typical severity
Per MITRE
Not rated
Likelihood of attack
Per MITRE
1
Related weaknesses
CWEs this targets
Detailed
Abstraction
MITRE classification
Overview
CAPEC-221 (Data Serialization External Entities Blowup) is a detailed-level attack pattern catalogued by MITRE in the Common Attack Pattern Enumeration and Classification (CAPEC). It describes a recurring method attackers use to exploit software weaknesses.