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Timestamp metadata is cached when it fails snapshot rollback check

Moderate
cbgbt published GHSA-76g3-38jv-wxh4 Mar 27, 2025

Package

cargo tough (Rust)

Affected versions

< 0.20.0

Patched versions

0.20.0

Description

Summary

TUF repositories use the timestamp role to protect against rollback events by enabling an automated process to periodically sign the role's metadata. While tough will ensure that the version of snapshot metadata in new timestamp metadata files was always greater than or equal to the previously trusted version, it will only do so after persisting the timestamp metadata to its cache.

Impact

If the tough client successfully detects a rollback event in which timestamp metadata contains outdated snapshot metadata, the invalid timestamp metadata will still be persisted to cache as trusted. tough may then subsequently incorrectly identify valid timestamp metadata as being rolled back, preventing the client from consuming valid updates.

Impacted versions: < v0.20.0

Patches

A fix for this issue is available in tough version 0.20.0 and later. Customers are advised to upgrade to version 0.20.0 or later and ensure any forked or derivative code is patched to incorporate the new fixes.

Workarounds

There is no recommended work around. Customers are advised to upgrade to version 0.20.0 or the latest version.

References

If you have any questions or comments about this advisory we ask that you contact AWS/Amazon Security via our vulnerability reporting page [1] or directly via email to aws-security@amazon.com. Please do not create a public GitHub issue.

[1] Vulnerability reporting page: https://aws.amazon.com/security/vulnerability-reporting

Acknowledgement

These issues were identified by the TUF-Conformance project. We would like to thank Google for collaborating on this issue through the coordinated vulnerability disclosure process.

Severity

Moderate

CVSS overall score

This score calculates overall vulnerability severity from 0 to 10 and is based on the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS).
/ 10

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector
Network
Attack complexity
High
Privileges required
High
User interaction
Required
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
High

CVSS v3 base metrics

Attack vector: More severe the more the remote (logically and physically) an attacker can be in order to exploit the vulnerability.
Attack complexity: More severe for the least complex attacks.
Privileges required: More severe if no privileges are required.
User interaction: More severe when no user interaction is required.
Scope: More severe when a scope change occurs, e.g. one vulnerable component impacts resources in components beyond its security scope.
Confidentiality: More severe when loss of data confidentiality is highest, measuring the level of data access available to an unauthorized user.
Integrity: More severe when loss of data integrity is the highest, measuring the consequence of data modification possible by an unauthorized user.
Availability: More severe when the loss of impacted component availability is highest.
CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:H/UI:R/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:H

CVE ID

CVE-2025-2888

Weaknesses

Credits