CVE-2021-44504 – This vulnerability in FIS GT.M/YottaDB allows a... (How to Fix)

Q: What is the severity of CVE-2021-44504?

CVE-2021-44504 has a CVSS score of 7.5 (HIGH). This vulnerability in FIS GT.M/YottaDB allows attackers to cause a denial of service (crash) by sending crafted input that triggers an integer overflow. The overflow causes a negative value to be misinterpreted during bounds checking, leading to a stack-based buffer overflow via memcpy. Systems running vulnerable versions of GT.M/YottaDB are affected.

📋 TL;DR

This vulnerability in FIS GT.M/YottaDB allows attackers to cause a denial of service (crash) by sending crafted input that triggers an integer overflow. The overflow causes a negative value to be misinterpreted during bounds checking, leading to a stack-based buffer overflow via memcpy. Systems running vulnerable versions of GT.M/YottaDB are affected.

💻 Affected Systems

Products:

FIS GT.M
YottaDB

Versions: All versions through V7.0-000

Operating Systems: All platforms running GT.M/YottaDB

Default Config Vulnerable: ⚠️ Yes

Notes: Affects the core database engine, so all deployments using vulnerable versions are affected regardless of configuration.

📦 What is this software?

Gt.m by Fisglobal

View all CVEs affecting Gt.m →

⚠️ Risk & Real-World Impact

🔴

Worst Case

Complete service disruption through denial of service, potentially leading to data corruption or system instability in applications relying on the database.

🟠

Likely Case

Service crash and denial of service affecting database availability and dependent applications.

🟢

If Mitigated

Limited impact with proper input validation and network segmentation preventing malicious input from reaching vulnerable systems.

🌐 Internet-Facing: MEDIUM - While exploitation requires crafted input, internet-facing GT.M/YottaDB instances could be targeted for DoS attacks.

🏢 Internal Only: MEDIUM - Internal systems could be exploited by authenticated users or through other attack vectors to cause service disruption.

🎯 Exploit Status

Public PoC: ✅ No

Weaponized: LIKELY

Unauthenticated Exploit: ⚠️ Yes

Complexity: LOW

The vulnerability description suggests straightforward exploitation via crafted input, though no public exploit code has been documented.

🛠️ Fix & Mitigation

✅ Official Fix

Patch Version: V7.0-002 and later

Vendor Advisory: http://tinco.pair.com/bhaskar/gtm/doc/articles/GTM_V7.0-002_Release_Notes.html

Restart Required: Yes

Instructions:

1. Download GT.M V7.0-002 or later from official sources. 2. Stop all GT.M/YottaDB processes. 3. Install the updated version following vendor documentation. 4. Restart database services.

🔧 Temporary Workarounds

Input validation and filtering

all

Implement strict input validation to reject malformed or unexpected input before it reaches the database engine.

Network segmentation and access controls

all

Restrict network access to GT.M/YottaDB instances to only trusted sources and applications.

🧯 If You Can't Patch

Implement application-level input validation to filter out potentially malicious input patterns
Deploy network-based intrusion prevention systems (IPS) to detect and block exploitation attempts

🔍 How to Verify

Check if Vulnerable:

Check GT.M version using 'mumps -version' or examine installation directory for version information. Versions V7.0-000 and earlier are vulnerable.

Check Version:

mumps -version

Verify Fix Applied:

After patching, verify version shows V7.0-002 or later using 'mumps -version' command.

📡 Detection & Monitoring

Log Indicators:

Segmentation fault errors in database logs
Unexpected process termination of GT.M/YottaDB processes
Stack trace dumps showing memcpy-related failures

Network Indicators:

Unusual input patterns or malformed requests to database ports
Traffic spikes followed by service unavailability

SIEM Query:

source="gtm_logs" AND ("segmentation fault" OR "memcpy" OR "SIGSEGV")

📊 Metadata

CVE ID: CVE-2021-44504

CVSS v3 Score: 7.5 (HIGH)

CVSS Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

CWE: CWE-682

Published: April 15, 2022

Last Updated: November 21, 2024

🔗 References

http://tinco.pair.com/bhaskar/gtm/doc/articles/GTM_V7.0-002_Release_Notes.html Release Notes,Third Party Advisory
https://gitlab.com/YottaDB/DB/YDB/-/issues/828 Issue Tracking,Patch,Third Party Advisory
https://sourceforge.net/projects/fis-gtm/files/ Product,Third Party Advisory
http://tinco.pair.com/bhaskar/gtm/doc/articles/GTM_V7.0-002_Release_Notes.html Release Notes,Third Party Advisory
https://gitlab.com/YottaDB/DB/YDB/-/issues/828 Issue Tracking,Patch,Third Party Advisory
https://sourceforge.net/projects/fis-gtm/files/ Product,Third Party Advisory

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