CVE-2022-29218: Unauthorized takeover for new versions of some platform-specific gems

Vulnerability summary

CVE-2022-29218 is a high (CVSS 7.7) Improper Privilege Management vulnerability in rubygems rubygems.org. EPSS estimates a 1.31% chance of exploitation in the next 30 days, higher than 70.4% of scored vulnerabilities. 1 public exploit is recorded.

Timeline

1. 12-05-2022
   PublishedVulnerability first disclosed.
2. 22-04-2025
   Last modifiedVulnerability information updated.

Description

RubyGems is a package registry used to supply software for the Ruby language ecosystem. An ordering mistake in the code that accepts gem uploads allowed some gems (with platforms ending in numbers, like `arm64-darwin-21`) to be temporarily replaced in the CDN cache by a malicious package. The bug has been patched, and is believed to have never been exploited, based on an extensive review of logs and existing gems by rubygems. The easiest way to ensure that an application has not been exploited by this vulnerability is to verify all downloaded .gems checksums match the checksum recorded in the RubyGems.org database. RubyGems.org has been patched and is no longer vulnerable to this issue.

• CWE-269Improper Privilege ManagementThe product does not properly assign, modify, track, or check privileges for an actor, creating an unintended sphere of control for that actor.
• CWE-290Authentication Bypass by SpoofingThis attack-focused weakness is caused by incorrectly implemented authentication schemes that are subject to spoofing attacks.
• CWE-863Incorrect AuthorizationThe product performs an authorization check when an actor attempts to access a resource or perform an action, but it does not correctly perform the check.