Official definition

The product communicates with a host that provides a certificate, but the product does not properly ensure that the certificate is actually associated with that host.

Even if a certificate is well-formed, signed, and follows the chain of trust, it may simply be a valid certificate for a different site than the site that the product is interacting with. In order to ensure data integrity, the certificate must be valid, and it must pertain to the site that is being accessed.

Even if the product attempts to check the hostname, it is still possible to incorrectly check the hostname. For example, attackers could create a certificate with a name that begins with a trusted name followed by a NUL byte, which could cause some string-based comparisons to only examine the portion that contains the trusted name.

Characteristics

Modes of introduction

Implementation: When the product uses certificate pinning, the developer might not properly validate all relevant components of the certificate, such as verifying the hostname, before pinning the certificate. This can make it difficult or expensive to test after the pinning is complete.
Implementation: REALIZATION: This weakness is caused during implementation of an architectural security tactic.

Common consequences

Impact	Scope	Explanation
Gain Privileges or Assume Identity	Access Control	The data read from the system vouched for by the certificate may not be from the expected system.
Other	Authentication, Other	Trust afforded to the system in question - based on the malicious certificate - may allow for spoofing or redirection attacks.
Gain Privileges or Assume Identity, Other	Access Control, Other	If the certificate's host-specific data is not properly checked - such as the Common Name (CN) in the Subject or the Subject Alternative Name (SAN) extension of an X.509 certificate - it may be possible for a redirection or spoofing attack to allow a malicious host with a valid certificate to provide data, impersonating a trusted host.

Risk mitigations

Architecture and DesignFully check the hostname of the certificate and provide the user with adequate information about the nature of the problem and how to proceed.
ImplementationIf certificate pinning is being used, ensure that all relevant properties of the certificate are fully validated before the certificate is pinned, including the hostname.

Detection methods

Method	Approach	Effectiveness
Automated Static Analysis	Automated static analysis, commonly referred to as Static Application Security Testing (SAST), can find some instances of this weakness by analyzing source code (or binary/compiled code) without having to execute it. Typically, this is done by building a model of data flow and control flow, then searching for potentially-vulnerable patterns that connect "sources" (origins of input) with "sinks" (destinations where the data interacts with external components, a lower layer such as the OS, etc.)	High
Dynamic Analysis with Manual Results Interpretation	Set up an untrusted endpoint (e.g. a server) with which the product will connect. Create a test certificate that uses an invalid hostname but is signed by a trusted CA and provide this certificate from the untrusted endpoint. If the product performs any operations instead of disconnecting and reporting an error, then this indicates that the hostname is not being checked and the test certificate has been accepted.	—
Black Box	When Certificate Pinning is being used in a mobile application, consider using a tool such as Spinner [REF-955]. This methodology might be extensible to other technologies.	—

Representative vulnerabilities

Below are representative vulnerabilities related to this CWE, prioritized by severity.

Sources (8)

MITRE CWE

CWE Terms of Use The CLASP Application Security Process

cs.utexas.edu

www2.dcsec.uni-hannover.de

developer.ibm.com

linuxjournal.com

flaviodgarcia.com

CWE-297: Improper Validation of Certificate with Host Mismatch

What is CWE-297?

Data statistics

Vulnerabilities mapped to CWE-297

Vulnerabilities in CISA KEV for CWE-297