CWE-112: Missing XML Validation | Glexia
CWE-112 (Missing XML Validation) weakness overview with consequences, detection methods, mitigations, related CVEs and MITRE ATT&CK context.
Glexia's Take · Automated analysis
CWE-112: Missing XML Validation
Missing XML Validation represents a recurring weakness pattern that can create exploitable paths when design, validation, or implementation controls are missing.
Executive Impact
- Integrity: Unexpected State
Developer Pattern
CWE-112 is the kind of defect developers can usually prevent with explicit validation, safer framework defaults, and tests that exercise hostile input or unsafe state transitions.
Automation confidence
high confidence from CWE-112, 4.20.
Generated from the cited source records. This long-tail analysis has not been individually reviewed by a named human.
Official CWE Definition
CWE-112: Missing XML Validation
The product accepts XML from an untrusted source but does not validate the XML against the proper schema.
Most successful attacks begin with a violation of the programmer's assumptions. By accepting an XML document without validating it against a DTD or XML schema, the programmer leaves a door open for attackers to provide unexpected, unreasonable, or malicious input.
Developer And Remediation Guidance
How teams prevent and detect this weakness
Causes
- The following code loads and parses an XML file. The XML file is loaded without validating it against a known XML Schema or DTD.
- The following code creates a DocumentBuilder object to be used in building an XML document. The DocumentBuilder object does not validate an XML document against a schema, making it possible to create an invalid XML document.
Remediation
- Architecture and Design: Always validate XML input against a known XML Schema or DTD. It is not possible for an XML parser to validate all aspects of a document's content because a parser cannot understand the complete semantics of the data. However, a parser can do a complete and thorough job of checking the document's structure and therefore guarantee to the code that processes the document that the content is well-formed.
Detection
- 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.)
Mappings
Related CVEs, CWEs, and ATT&CK context
Related CWEs
ATT&CK Relevance
ATT&CK relevance is shown only when reviewed or responsibly inferred.