CWE - CWE-273: Improper Check for Dropped Privileges (4.18)

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CWE Glossary Definition

CWE-273: Improper Check for Dropped Privileges

Weakness ID: 273

Vulnerability Mapping: ALLOWED This CWE ID may be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities
Abstraction: Base Base - a weakness that is still mostly independent of a resource or technology, but with sufficient details to provide specific methods for detection and prevention. Base level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 2 or 3 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, technology, language, and resource.

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Description

The product attempts to drop privileges but does not check or incorrectly checks to see if the drop succeeded.

Extended Description

If the drop fails, the product will continue to run with the raised privileges, which might provide additional access to unprivileged users.

Common Consequences

Section HelpThis table specifies different individual consequences associated with the weakness. The Scope identifies the application security area that is violated, while the Impact describes the negative technical impact that arises if an adversary succeeds in exploiting this weakness. The Likelihood provides information about how likely the specific consequence is expected to be seen relative to the other consequences in the list. For example, there may be high likelihood that a weakness will be exploited to achieve a certain impact, but a low likelihood that it will be exploited to achieve a different impact.

Impact	Details
Gain Privileges or Assume Identity	Scope: Access Control If privileges are not dropped, neither are access rights of the user. Often these rights can be prevented from being dropped.
Gain Privileges or Assume Identity; Hide Activities	Scope: Access Control, Non-Repudiation If privileges are not dropped, in some cases the system may record actions as the user which is being impersonated rather than the impersonator.

Potential Mitigations

Phase(s)	Mitigation
Architecture and Design	Strategy: Separation of Privilege Compartmentalize the system to have "safe" areas where trust boundaries can be unambiguously drawn. Do not allow sensitive data to go outside of the trust boundary and always be careful when interfacing with a compartment outside of the safe area. Ensure that appropriate compartmentalization is built into the system design, and the compartmentalization allows for and reinforces privilege separation functionality. Architects and designers should rely on the principle of least privilege to decide the appropriate time to use privileges and the time to drop privileges.
Implementation	Check the results of all functions that return a value and verify that the value is expected. Effectiveness: High Note: Checking the return value of the function will typically be sufficient, however beware of race conditions (CWE-362) in a concurrent environment.
Implementation	In Windows, make sure that the process token has the SeImpersonatePrivilege(Microsoft Server 2003). Code that relies on impersonation for security must ensure that the impersonation succeeded, i.e., that a proper privilege demotion happened.

Relationships

Section Help This table shows the weaknesses and high level categories that are related to this weakness. These relationships are defined as ChildOf, ParentOf, MemberOf and give insight to similar items that may exist at higher and lower levels of abstraction. In addition, relationships such as PeerOf and CanAlsoBe are defined to show similar weaknesses that the user may want to explore.

Relevant to the view "Research Concepts" (View-1000)

Nature	Type	ID	Name
ChildOf	Class Class - a weakness that is described in a very abstract fashion, typically independent of any specific language or technology. More specific than a Pillar Weakness, but more general than a Base Weakness. Class level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 1 or 2 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, and resource.	271	Privilege Dropping / Lowering Errors
ChildOf	Class Class - a weakness that is described in a very abstract fashion, typically independent of any specific language or technology. More specific than a Pillar Weakness, but more general than a Base Weakness. Class level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 1 or 2 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, and resource.	754	Improper Check for Unusual or Exceptional Conditions
PeerOf	Base Base - a weakness that is still mostly independent of a resource or technology, but with sufficient details to provide specific methods for detection and prevention. Base level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 2 or 3 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, technology, language, and resource.	252	Unchecked Return Value

Relevant to the view "Software Development" (View-699)

Nature	Type	ID	Name
MemberOf	Category Category - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	265	Privilege Issues

Relevant to the view "Weaknesses for Simplified Mapping of Published Vulnerabilities" (View-1003)

Nature	Type	ID	Name
ChildOf	Class Class - a weakness that is described in a very abstract fashion, typically independent of any specific language or technology. More specific than a Pillar Weakness, but more general than a Base Weakness. Class level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 1 or 2 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, and resource.	754	Improper Check for Unusual or Exceptional Conditions

Relevant to the view "Architectural Concepts" (View-1008)

Nature	Type	ID	Name
MemberOf	Category Category - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	1011	Authorize Actors

Background Details

In Windows based environments that have access control, impersonation is used so that access checks can be performed on a client identity by a server with higher privileges. By impersonating the client, the server is restricted to client-level security -- although in different threads it may have much higher privileges.

Modes Of Introduction

Section HelpThe different Modes of Introduction provide information about how and when this weakness may be introduced. The Phase identifies a point in the life cycle at which introduction may occur, while the Note provides a typical scenario related to introduction during the given phase.

Phase	Note
Implementation	REALIZATION: This weakness is caused during implementation of an architectural security tactic. This issue is likely to occur in restrictive environments in which the operating system or application provides fine-grained control over privilege management.

Phase

Note

Implementation

REALIZATION: This weakness is caused during implementation of an architectural security tactic.

This issue is likely to occur in restrictive environments in which the operating system or application provides fine-grained control over privilege management.

Applicable Platforms

Section HelpThis listing shows possible areas for which the given weakness could appear. These may be for specific named Languages, Operating Systems, Architectures, Paradigms, Technologies, or a class of such platforms. The platform is listed along with how frequently the given weakness appears for that instance.

Languages

Class: Not Language-Specific (Undetermined Prevalence)

Likelihood Of Exploit

Medium

Demonstrative Examples

Example 1

This code attempts to take on the privileges of a user before creating a file, thus avoiding performing the action with unnecessarily high privileges:

(bad code)

Example Language: C++

bool DoSecureStuff(HANDLE hPipe) {

bool fDataWritten = false;
ImpersonateNamedPipeClient(hPipe);
HANDLE hFile = CreateFile(...);
/../
RevertToSelf()
/../

}

The call to ImpersonateNamedPipeClient may fail, but the return value is not checked. If the call fails, the code may execute with higher privileges than intended. In this case, an attacker could exploit this behavior to write a file to a location that the attacker does not have access to.

Selected Observed Examples

Note: this is a curated list of examples for users to understand the variety of ways in which this weakness can be introduced. It is not a complete list of all CVEs that are related to this CWE entry.

Reference	Description
CVE-2006-4447	Program does not check return value when invoking functions to drop privileges, which could leave users with higher privileges than expected by forcing those functions to fail.
CVE-2006-2916	Program does not check return value when invoking functions to drop privileges, which could leave users with higher privileges than expected by forcing those functions to fail.

Weakness Ordinalities

Ordinality	Description
Primary	(where the weakness exists independent of other weaknesses)

Detection Methods

Method	Details
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.) Effectiveness: High

Method

Details

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.)

Effectiveness: High

Affected Resources

System Process

Memberships

Section HelpThis MemberOf Relationships table shows additional CWE Categories and Views that reference this weakness as a member. This information is often useful in understanding where a weakness fits within the context of external information sources.

Nature	Type	ID	Name
MemberOf	CategoryCategory - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	748	CERT C Secure Coding Standard (2008) Appendix - POSIX (POS)
MemberOf	ViewView - a subset of CWE entries that provides a way of examining CWE content. The two main view structures are Slices (flat lists) and Graphs (containing relationships between entries).	884	CWE Cross-section
MemberOf	CategoryCategory - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	962	SFP Secondary Cluster: Unchecked Status Condition
MemberOf	CategoryCategory - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	1171	SEI CERT C Coding Standard - Guidelines 50. POSIX (POS)
MemberOf	CategoryCategory - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	1396	Comprehensive Categorization: Access Control

Vulnerability Mapping Notes

Usage ALLOWED

(this CWE ID may be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities)

Reason Acceptable-Use

Rationale

This CWE entry is at the Base level of abstraction, which is a preferred level of abstraction for mapping to the root causes of vulnerabilities.

Comments

Carefully read both the name and description to ensure that this mapping is an appropriate fit. Do not try to 'force' a mapping to a lower-level Base/Variant simply to comply with this preferred level of abstraction.

Taxonomy Mappings

Mapped Taxonomy Name	Node ID	Fit	Mapped Node Name
CLASP	Failure to check whether privileges were dropped successfully
CERT C Secure Coding	POS37-C	Exact	Ensure that privilege relinquishment is successful
Software Fault Patterns	SFP4	Unchecked Status Condition

References

[REF-18] Secure Software, Inc.. "The CLASP Application Security Process". 2005.
<https://cwe.mitre.org/documents/sources/TheCLASPApplicationSecurityProcess.pdf>. (URL validated: 2024年11月17日)

Content History

Submissions
Submission Date	Submitter	Organization
2006年07月19日 (CWE Draft 3, 2006年07月19日)	CLASP
2006年07月19日 (CWE Draft 3, 2006年07月19日)
Modifications
Modification Date	Modifier	Organization
2023年06月29日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2023年06月29日	updated Mapping_Notes
2023年04月27日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2023年04月27日	updated Detection_Factors, Relationships, Time_of_Introduction
2023年01月31日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2023年01月31日	updated Description
2020年12月10日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2020年12月10日	updated Potential_Mitigations
2020年02月24日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2020年02月24日	updated References, Relationships, Time_of_Introduction
2019年06月20日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2019年06月20日	updated Relationships
2019年01月03日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2019年01月03日	updated Relationships
2017年11月08日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2017年11月08日	updated Applicable_Platforms, Causal_Nature, Demonstrative_Examples, Modes_of_Introduction, Relationships, Taxonomy_Mappings
2014年07月30日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2014年07月30日	updated Relationships, Taxonomy_Mappings
2014年06月23日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2014年06月23日	updated Background_Details, Other_Notes, Potential_Mitigations
2012年10月30日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2012年10月30日	updated Demonstrative_Examples, Potential_Mitigations
2012年05月11日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2012年05月11日	updated Observed_Examples, Relationships
2011年06月01日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2011年06月01日	updated Common_Consequences
2009年05月27日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2009年05月27日	updated Name
2009年03月10日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2009年03月10日	updated Description, Name, Relationships
2008年11月24日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2008年11月24日	updated Relationships, Taxonomy_Mappings
2008年09月08日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2008年09月08日	updated Common_Consequences, Description, Modes_of_Introduction, Relationships, Other_Notes, Taxonomy_Mappings, Weakness_Ordinalities
2008年07月01日	Eric Dalci	Cigital
2008年07月01日	updated Time_of_Introduction
Previous Entry Names
Change Date	Previous Entry Name
2009年03月10日	Failure to Check Whether Privileges Were Dropped Successfully
2009年05月27日	Improper Check for Successfully Dropped Privileges

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Page Last Updated: September 09, 2025

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