CWE - CWE-654: Reliance on a Single Factor in a Security Decision (4.18)

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CWE Glossary Definition

CWE-654: Reliance on a Single Factor in a Security Decision

Weakness ID: 654

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

A protection mechanism relies exclusively, or to a large extent, on the evaluation of a single condition or the integrity of a single object or entity in order to make a decision about granting access to restricted resources or functionality.

Alternate Terms

Separation of Privilege

Some people and publications use the term "Separation of Privilege" to describe this weakness, but this term has dual meanings in current usage. While this entry is closely associated with the original definition of "Separation of Privilege" by Saltzer and Schroeder, others use the same term to describe poor compartmentalization (CWE-653). Because there are multiple interpretations, use of the "Separation of Privilege" term is discouraged.

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 the single factor is compromised (e.g. by theft or spoofing), then the integrity of the entire security mechanism can be violated with respect to the user that is identified by that factor.
Hide Activities	Scope: Non-Repudiation It can become difficult or impossible for the product to be able to distinguish between legitimate activities by the entity who provided the factor, versus illegitimate activities by an attacker.

Potential Mitigations

Phase(s)	Mitigation
Architecture and Design	Use multiple simultaneous checks before granting access to critical operations or granting critical privileges. A weaker but helpful mitigation is to use several successive checks (multiple layers of security).
Architecture and Design	Use redundant access rules on different choke points (e.g., firewalls).

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.	657	Violation of Secure Design Principles
ChildOf	Pillar Pillar - a weakness that is the most abstract type of weakness and represents a theme for all class/base/variant weaknesses related to it. A Pillar is different from a Category as a Pillar is still technically a type of weakness that describes a mistake, while a Category represents a common characteristic used to group related things.	693	Protection Mechanism Failure
ParentOf	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.	308	Use of Single-factor Authentication
ParentOf	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.	309	Use of Password System for Primary Authentication
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.	1293	Missing Source Correlation of Multiple Independent Data

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.	1006	Bad Coding Practices

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
Architecture and Design
Implementation
Operation

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)

Demonstrative Examples

Example 1

Password-only authentication is perhaps the most well-known example of use of a single factor. Anybody who knows a user's password can impersonate that user.

Example 2

When authenticating, use multiple factors, such as "something you know" (such as a password) and "something you have" (such as a hardware-based one-time password generator, or a biometric device).

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-2022-35248	Chat application skips validation when Central Authentication Service (CAS) is enabled, effectively removing the second factor from two-factor authentication

Weakness Ordinalities

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

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.	975	SFP Secondary Cluster: Architecture
MemberOf	CategoryCategory - a CWE entry that contains a set of other entries that share a common characteristic.	1418	Comprehensive Categorization: Violation of Secure Design Principles

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.

Notes

Maintenance

This entry is closely associated with the term "Separation of Privilege." This term is used in several different ways in the industry, but they generally combine two closely related principles: compartmentalization (CWE-653) and using only one factor in a security decision (this entry). Proper compartmentalization implicitly introduces multiple factors into a security decision, but there can be cases in which multiple factors are required for authentication or other mechanisms that do not involve compartmentalization, such as performing all required checks on a submitted certificate. It is likely that CWE-653 and CWE-654 will provoke further discussion.

Taxonomy Mappings

Mapped Taxonomy Name	Node ID	Fit
ISA/IEC 62443	Part 4-1	Req SD-3
ISA/IEC 62443	Part 4-1	Req SD-4
ISA/IEC 62443	Part 4-1	Req SI-1

Related Attack Patterns

CAPEC-ID	Attack Pattern Name
CAPEC-16	Dictionary-based Password Attack
CAPEC-274	HTTP Verb Tampering
CAPEC-49	Password Brute Forcing
CAPEC-55	Rainbow Table Password Cracking
CAPEC-560	Use of Known Domain Credentials
CAPEC-565	Password Spraying
CAPEC-600	Credential Stuffing
CAPEC-652	Use of Known Kerberos Credentials
CAPEC-653	Use of Known Operating System Credentials
CAPEC-70	Try Common or Default Usernames and Passwords

References

[REF-196] Jerome H. Saltzer and Michael D. Schroeder. "The Protection of Information in Computer Systems". Proceedings of the IEEE 63. 1975-09.
<http://web.mit.edu/Saltzer/www/publications/protection/>.

[REF-535] Sean Barnum and Michael Gegick. "Separation of Privilege". 2005年12月06日.
<https://web.archive.org/web/20220126060047/https://www.cisa.gov/uscert/bsi/articles/knowledge/principles/separation-of-privilege>. (URL validated: 2023年04月07日)

Content History

Submissions
Submission Date	Submitter	Organization
2008年01月18日 (CWE Draft 8, 2008年01月30日)	Pascal Meunier	Purdue University
2008年01月18日 (CWE Draft 8, 2008年01月30日)
Contributions
Contribution Date	Contributor	Organization
2023年04月25日	"Mapping CWE to 62443" Sub-Working Group	CWE-CAPEC ICS/OT SIG
2023年04月25日	Suggested mappings to ISA/IEC 62443.
Modifications
Modification Date	Modifier	Organization
2023年10月26日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2023年10月26日	updated Observed_Examples
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 References, Relationships, Taxonomy_Mappings
2022年10月13日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2022年10月13日	updated References
2021年03月15日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2021年03月15日	updated Alternate_Terms, Maintenance_Notes
2020年12月10日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2020年12月10日	updated Relationships
2020年08月20日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2020年08月20日	updated Related_Attack_Patterns
2020年02月24日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2020年02月24日	updated Relationships
2017年11月08日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2017年11月08日	updated Applicable_Platforms, Causal_Nature
2014年07月30日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2014年07月30日	updated Relationships
2013年02月21日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2013年02月21日	updated Potential_Mitigations
2012年10月30日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2012年10月30日	updated Potential_Mitigations
2012年05月11日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2012年05月11日	updated Relationships
2011年06月01日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2011年06月01日	updated Common_Consequences, Maintenance_Notes, Other_Notes
2010年04月05日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2010年04月05日	updated Related_Attack_Patterns
2009年05月27日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2009年05月27日	updated Relationships
2009年01月12日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2009年01月12日	updated Description, Name
2008年09月08日	CWE Content Team	MITRE
2008年09月08日	updated Alternate_Terms, Common_Consequences, Relationships, Other_Notes, 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01月12日	Design Principle Violation: Reliance on a Single Factor in a Security Decision

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Page Last Updated: September 09, 2025

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