CWE-69: Improper Handling of Windows ::DATA Alternate… | Glexia
CWE-69 (Improper Handling of Windows ::DATA Alternate Data Stream) weakness overview with consequences, detection methods, mitigations, related CVEs and MITRE…
Glexia's Take · Automated analysis
CWE-69: Improper Handling of Windows ::DATA Alternate Data Stream
Improper Handling of Windows ::DATA Alternate Data Stream represents a recurring weakness pattern that can create exploitable paths when design, validation, or implementation controls are missing.
Executive Impact
- Access Control Non-Repudiation Other: Bypass Protection Mechanism Hide Activities Other
Developer Pattern
CWE-69 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-69, 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-69: Improper Handling of Windows ::DATA Alternate Data Stream
The product does not properly prevent access to, or detect usage of, alternate data streams (ADS).
An attacker can use an ADS to hide information about a file (e.g. size, the name of the process) from a system or file browser tools such as Windows Explorer and 'dir' at the command line utility. Alternately, the attacker might be able to bypass intended access restrictions for the associated data fork.
Developer And Remediation Guidance
How teams prevent and detect this weakness
Causes
- Missing validation
- Unsafe defaults
- Insufficient authorization or memory-safety invariant
Remediation
- Implementation: Ensure that the source code correctly parses the filename to read or write to the correct stream.
Detection
- Automated Analysis: Software tools are capable of finding ADSs on your system.
Mappings
Related CVEs, CWEs, and ATT&CK context
ATT&CK Relevance
ATT&CK relevance is shown only when reviewed or responsibly inferred.