CWE - CWE-361: CWE CATEGORY: 7PK - Time and State (4.18)

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CWE Glossary Definition

CWE CATEGORY: 7PK - Time and State

Category ID: 361

Vulnerability Mapping: PROHIBITED This CWE ID must not be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities

Summary

This category represents one of the phyla in the Seven Pernicious Kingdoms vulnerability classification. It includes weaknesses related to the improper management of time and state in an environment that supports simultaneous or near-simultaneous computation by multiple systems, processes, or threads. According to the authors of the Seven Pernicious Kingdoms, "Distributed computation is about time and state. That is, in order for more than one component to communicate, state must be shared, and all that takes time. Most programmers anthropomorphize their work. They think about one thread of control carrying out the entire program in the same way they would if they had to do the job themselves. Modern computers, however, switch between tasks very quickly, and in multi-core, multi-CPU, or distributed systems, two events may take place at exactly the same time. Defects rush to fill the gap between the programmer's model of how a program executes and what happens in reality. These defects are related to unexpected interactions between threads, processes, time, and information. These interactions happen through shared state: semaphores, variables, the file system, and, basically, anything that can store information."

Membership

Nature	Type	ID	Name
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).	700	Seven Pernicious Kingdoms
HasMember	BaseBase - 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.	364	Signal Handler Race Condition
HasMember	BaseBase - 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.	367	Time-of-check Time-of-use (TOCTOU) Race Condition
HasMember	ClassClass - 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.	377	Insecure Temporary File
HasMember	VariantVariant - a weakness that is linked to a certain type of product, typically involving a specific language or technology. More specific than a Base weakness. Variant level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 3 to 5 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, technology, language, and resource.	382	J2EE Bad Practices: Use of System.exit()
HasMember	VariantVariant - a weakness that is linked to a certain type of product, typically involving a specific language or technology. More specific than a Base weakness. Variant level weaknesses typically describe issues in terms of 3 to 5 of the following dimensions: behavior, property, technology, language, and resource.	383	J2EE Bad Practices: Direct Use of Threads
HasMember	CompositeComposite - a Compound Element that consists of two or more distinct weaknesses, in which all weaknesses must be present at the same time in order for a potential vulnerability to arise. Removing any of the weaknesses eliminates or sharply reduces the risk. One weakness, X, can be "broken down" into component weaknesses Y and Z. There can be cases in which one weakness might not be essential to a composite, but changes the nature of the composite when it becomes a vulnerability.	384	Session Fixation
HasMember	BaseBase - 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.	412	Unrestricted Externally Accessible Lock

Vulnerability Mapping Notes

Usage: PROHIBITED

(this CWE ID must not be used to map to real-world vulnerabilities)

Reason: Category

Rationale:

This entry is a Category. Using categories for mapping has been discouraged since 2019. Categories are informal organizational groupings of weaknesses that can help CWE users with data aggregation, navigation, and browsing. However, they are not weaknesses in themselves.

Comments:

See member weaknesses of this category.

References

[REF-6] Katrina Tsipenyuk, Brian Chess and Gary McGraw. "Seven Pernicious Kingdoms: A Taxonomy of Software Security Errors". NIST Workshop on Software Security Assurance Tools Techniques and Metrics. NIST. 2005年11月07日. <https://samate.nist.gov/SSATTM_Content/papers/Seven%20Pernicious%20Kingdoms%20-%20Taxonomy%20of%20Sw%20Security%20Errors%20-%20Tsipenyuk%20-%20Chess%20-%20McGraw.pdf>.

Content History

Submissions
Submission Date	Submitter	Organization
2006年07月19日 (CWE Draft 3, 2006年07月19日)	7 Pernicious Kingdoms
2006年07月19日 (CWE Draft 3, 2006年07月19日)
Modifications
Modification Date	Modifier	Organization
2008年09月08日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2008年09月08日	updated Relationships, Taxonomy_Mappings
2008年10月14日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2008年10月14日	updated Description
2011年03月29日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2011年03月29日	updated Relationships
2012年05月11日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2012年05月11日	updated Related_Attack_Patterns
2015年12月07日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2015年12月07日	updated Relationships
2017年01月19日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2017年01月19日	updated Relationships
2017年11月08日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2017年11月08日	updated Description, Name, References, Related_Attack_Patterns, Taxonomy_Mappings
2019年06月20日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2019年06月20日	updated Relationships
2020年02月24日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2020年02月24日	updated References, Relationships
2023年04月27日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2023年04月27日	updated Mapping_Notes
2023年06月29日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2023年06月29日	updated Mapping_Notes
Previous Entry Names
Change Date	Previous Entry Name
2017年11月08日	Time and State

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Page Last Updated: September 09, 2025

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