// For flags

CVE-2022-4304

Timing Oracle in RSA Decryption

Severity Score

5.9
*CVSS v3.1

Exploit Likelihood

*EPSS

Affected Versions

*CPE

Public Exploits

1
*Multiple Sources

Exploited in Wild

-
*KEV

Decision

-
*SSVC
Descriptions

A timing based side channel exists in the OpenSSL RSA Decryption implementation
which could be sufficient to recover a plaintext across a network in a
Bleichenbacher style attack. To achieve a successful decryption an attacker
would have to be able to send a very large number of trial messages for
decryption. The vulnerability affects all RSA padding modes: PKCS#1 v1.5,
RSA-OEAP and RSASVE. For example, in a TLS connection, RSA is commonly used by a client to send an
encrypted pre-master secret to the server. An attacker that had observed a
genuine connection between a client and a server could use this flaw to send
trial messages to the server and record the time taken to process them. After a
sufficiently large number of messages the attacker could recover the pre-master
secret used for the original connection and thus be able to decrypt the
application data sent over that connection.

A timing-based side channel exists in the OpenSSL RSA Decryption implementation, which could be sufficient to recover a ciphertext across a network in a Bleichenbacher style attack. To achieve a successful decryption, an attacker would have to be able to send a very large number of trial messages for decryption. This issue affects all RSA padding modes: PKCS#1 v1.5, RSA-OEAP, and RSASVE.

A timing based side channel exists in the OpenSSL RSA Decryption implementation which could be sufficient to recover a plaintext across a network in a Bleichenbacher style attack. To achieve a successful decryption an attacker would have to be able to send a very large number of trial messages for decryption. The vulnerability affects all RSA padding modes: PKCS#1 v1.5, RSA-OEAP and RSASVE. For example, in a TLS connection, RSA is commonly used by a client to send an encrypted pre-master secret to the server. An attacker that had observed a genuine connection between a client and a server could use this flaw to send trial messages to the server and record the time taken to process them. After a sufficiently large number of messages the attacker could recover the pre-master secret used for the original connection and thus be able to decrypt the application data sent over that connection.

There is a type confusion vulnerability relating to X.400 address processing inside an X.509 GeneralName. X.400 addresses were parsed as an ASN1_STRING but the public structure definition for GENERAL_NAME incorrectly specified the type of the x400Address field as ASN1_TYPE. This field is subsequently interpreted by the OpenSSL function GENERAL_NAME_cmp as an ASN1_TYPE rather than an ASN1_STRING. A timing based side channel exists in the OpenSSL RSA Decryption implementation. The public API function BIO_new_NDEF is a helper function used for streaming ASN.1 data via a BIO. It is primarily used internally to OpenSSL to support the SMIME, CMS and PKCS7 streaming capabilities, but may also be called directly by end user applications. The function receives a BIO from the caller, prepends a new BIO_f_asn1 filter BIO onto the front of it to form a BIO chain, and then returns the new head of the BIO chain to the caller. Under certain conditions, for example if a CMS recipient public key is invalid, the new filter BIO is freed and the function returns a NULL result indicating a failure. However, in this case, the BIO chain is not properly cleaned up and the BIO passed by the caller still retains internal pointers to the previously freed filter BIO. The function PEM_read_bio_ex() reads a PEM file from a BIO and parses and decodes the "name" (e.g. "CERTIFICATE"), any header data and the payload data. If the function succeeds then the "name_out", "header" and "data" arguments are populated with pointers to buffers containing the relevant decoded data. The caller is responsible for freeing those buffers. It is possible to construct a PEM file that results in 0 bytes of payload data. In this case PEM_read_bio_ex() will return a failure code but will populate the header argument with a pointer to a buffer that has already been freed. When CRL checking is enabled (i.e. the application sets the X509_V_FLAG_CRL_CHECK flag), this vulnerability may allow an attacker to pass arbitrary pointers to a memcmp call, enabling them to read memory contents or enact a denial of service. In most cases, the attack requires the attacker to provide both the certificate chain and CRL, neither of which need to have a valid signature. If the attacker only controls one of these inputs, the other input must already contain an X.400 address as a CRL distribution point, which is uncommon. As such, this vulnerability is most likely to only affect applications which have implemented their own functionality for retrieving CRLs over a network. A timing based side channel exists in the OpenSSL RSA Decryption implementation which could be sufficient to recover a plaintext across a network in a Bleichenbacher style attack. To achieve a successful decryption an attacker would have to be able to send a very large number of trial messages for decryption. The vulnerability affects all RSA padding modes: PKCS#1 v1.5, RSA-OEAP and RSASVE. A use-after-free will occur under certain conditions. This will most likely result in a crash. A double free may occur. This will most likely lead to a crash. This could be exploited by an attacker who has the ability to supply malicious PEM files for parsing to achieve a denial of service attack.

*Credits: Hubert Kario from RedHat, Dmitry Belyavsky from RedHat, Hubert Kario from RedHat
CVSS Scores
Attack Vector
Network
Attack Complexity
High
Privileges Required
None
User Interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
None
Availability
None
Attack Vector
Network
Attack Complexity
High
Privileges Required
None
User Interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
High
Availability
None
Attack Vector
Network
Attack Complexity
High
Authentication
None
Confidentiality
Complete
Integrity
None
Availability
None
* Common Vulnerability Scoring System
SSVC
  • Decision:-
Exploitation
None
Automatable
No
Tech. Impact
Denial
* Organization's Worst-case Scenario
Timeline
  • 2022-12-06 CVE Reserved
  • 2023-02-07 CVE Published
  • 2023-04-24 First Exploit
  • 2025-05-01 CVE Updated
  • 2025-07-01 EPSS Updated
  • ---------- Exploited in Wild
  • ---------- KEV Due Date
CWE
  • CWE-203: Observable Discrepancy
CAPEC
Affected Vendors, Products, and Versions
Vendor Product Version Other Status
Vendor Product Version Other Status <-- --> Vendor Product Version Other Status
Openssl
Search vendor "Openssl"
Openssl
Search vendor "Openssl" for product "Openssl"
>= 1.0.2 < 1.0.2zg
Search vendor "Openssl" for product "Openssl" and version " >= 1.0.2 < 1.0.2zg"
-
Affected
Openssl
Search vendor "Openssl"
Openssl
Search vendor "Openssl" for product "Openssl"
>= 1.1.1 < 1.1.1t
Search vendor "Openssl" for product "Openssl" and version " >= 1.1.1 < 1.1.1t"
-
Affected
Openssl
Search vendor "Openssl"
Openssl
Search vendor "Openssl" for product "Openssl"
>= 3.0.0 < 3.0.8
Search vendor "Openssl" for product "Openssl" and version " >= 3.0.0 < 3.0.8"
-
Affected
Stormshield
Search vendor "Stormshield"
Endpoint Security
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Endpoint Security"
< 7.2.40
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Endpoint Security" and version " < 7.2.40"
-
Affected
Stormshield
Search vendor "Stormshield"
Sslvpn
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Sslvpn"
< 3.2.1
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Sslvpn" and version " < 3.2.1"
-
Affected
Stormshield
Search vendor "Stormshield"
Stormshield Network Security
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Stormshield Network Security"
>= 2.7.0 < 2.7.11
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Stormshield Network Security" and version " >= 2.7.0 < 2.7.11"
-
Affected
Stormshield
Search vendor "Stormshield"
Stormshield Network Security
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Stormshield Network Security"
>= 2.8.0 < 3.7.34
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Stormshield Network Security" and version " >= 2.8.0 < 3.7.34"
-
Affected
Stormshield
Search vendor "Stormshield"
Stormshield Network Security
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Stormshield Network Security"
>= 3.8.0 < 3.11.22
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Stormshield Network Security" and version " >= 3.8.0 < 3.11.22"
-
Affected
Stormshield
Search vendor "Stormshield"
Stormshield Network Security
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Stormshield Network Security"
>= 4.0.0 < 4.3.16
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Stormshield Network Security" and version " >= 4.0.0 < 4.3.16"
-
Affected
Stormshield
Search vendor "Stormshield"
Stormshield Network Security
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Stormshield Network Security"
>= 4.4.0 < 4.6.3
Search vendor "Stormshield" for product "Stormshield Network Security" and version " >= 4.4.0 < 4.6.3"
-
Affected