Comparing classes by name

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Vulnerabilities Table of Contents

Description
The practice of determining an object's type, based on its name, is dangerous since malicious code may purposely reuse class names in order to appear trusted.

Consequences


 * Authorization: If a program trusts based on the name of the object, to assume that it is the correct object, it may execute the wrong program.

Exposure period


 * Implementation: This flaw is a simple logic issue, introduced entirely at implementation time.

Platform


 * Languages: Java


 * Operating platforms: Any

Required resources

Any

Severity

High

Likelihood  of exploit

High

If the decision to trust the methods and data of an object is based on the name of a class, it is possible for malicious users to send objects of the same name as trusted classes and thereby gain the trust afforded to known classes and types.

Risk Factors

 * Talk about the factors that make this vulnerability likely or unlikely to actually happen
 * Discuss the technical impact of a successful exploit of this vulnerability
 * Consider the likely [business impacts] of a successful attack

Examples
if (inputClass.getClass.getName.equals("TrustedClassName")) { // Do something assuming you trust inputClass // ... }

Related Attacks

 * Attack 1
 * Attack 2

Related Vulnerabilities

 * Vulnerability 1
 * Vulnerabiltiy 2

Related Controls

 * Control 1
 * Control 2
 * Implementation: Use class equivalency to determine type. Rather than use the class name to determine if an object is of a given type, use the getClass method, and == operator.

Related Technical Impacts

 * Technical Impact 1
 * Technical Impact 2