Vulnerability · Published Jun 10, 2024 · Assigned by GitHub_M
CVE-2024-36405Control-flow timing leak in Kyber reference implementation when compiled with Clang 15-18 for -Os, -O1 and other options
Medium 5.9
In plain English
A medium-severity security flaw in liboqs from open-quantum-safe. There are no confirmed reports of exploitation so far. The chance it is exploited in the next 30 days is estimated at 0.5% (higher than 44% of all known vulnerabilities).
Official description
liboqs is a C-language cryptographic library that provides implementations of post-quantum cryptography algorithms. A control-flow timing lean has been identified in the reference implementation of the Kyber key encapsulation mechanism when it is compiled with Clang 15-18 for `-Os`, `-O1`, and other compilation options. A proof-of-concept local attack on the reference implementation leaks the entire ML-KEM 512 secret key in ~10 minutes using end-to-end decapsulation timing measurements. The issue has been fixed in version 0.10.1. As a possible workaround, some compiler options may produce vectorized code that does not leak secret information, however relying on these compiler options as a workaround may not be reliable.
Affected products (as reported)
| Vendor | Product | Versions |
|---|---|---|
| open-quantum-safe | liboqs | < 0.10.1 |
Weakness: CWE-208, CWE-385 · Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
References
- https://github.com/open-quantum-safe/liboqs/security/advisories/GHSA-f2v9-5498-2vpp x_refsource_CONFIRM
- https://github.com/open-quantum-safe/liboqs/commit/982c762c242ef549c914891b47bf6e0ed6321f91 x_refsource_MISC
- https://github.com/pq-crystals/kyber/commit/9b8d30698a3e7449aeb34e62339d4176f11e3c6c x_refsource_MISC
- https://github.com/open-quantum-safe/liboqs/blob/7eecda6095c003ddded7175a1ffdf35a2ce63ed5/src/kem/kyber/pqcrystals-kyber_kyber512_ref/poly.c#L166 x_refsource_MISC