CWE

Logging of Excessive Data

ID: 779		Date: (C)2012-05-14   (M)2022-10-10
Type: weakness		Status: DRAFT
Abstraction Type: Base

Description

The software logs too much information, making log files hard to process and possibly hindering recovery efforts or forensic analysis after an attack.

Extended Description

While logging is a good practice in general, and very high levels of logging are appropriate for debugging stages of development, too much logging in a production environment might hinder a system administrator's ability to detect anomalous conditions. This can provide cover for an attacker while attempting to penetrate a system, clutter the audit trail for forensic analysis, or make it more difficult to debug problems in a production environment.

Likelihood of Exploit: Low to Medium

Applicable Platforms
Language Class: Language-independent

Time Of Introduction

• Operation

Common Consequences

Scope	Technical Impact	Notes
Availability	DoS: resource consumption (CPU) DoS: resource consumption (other)	Log files can become so large that they consume excessive resources, such as disk and CPU, which can hinder the performance of the system.
Non-Repudiation	Hide activities	Logging too much information can make the log files of less use to forensics analysts and developers when trying to diagnose a problem or recover from an attack.
Non-Repudiation	Hide activities	If system administrators are unable to effectively process log files, attempted attacks may go undetected, possibly leading to eventual system compromise.

Detection Methods
None

Potential Mitigations

Phase	Strategy	Description	Effectiveness	Notes
Architecture and Design		Suppress large numbers of duplicate log messages and replace them with periodic summaries. For example, syslog may include an entry that states "last message repeated X times" when recording repeated events.
Architecture and Design		Support a maximum size for the log file that can be controlled by the administrator. If the maximum size is reached, the admin should be notified. Also, consider reducing functionality of the software. This may result in a denial-of-service to legitimate software users, but it will prevent the software from adversely impacting the entire system.
Implementation		Adjust configurations appropriately when software is transitioned from a debug state to production.

Relationships

Related CWE	Type	View	Chain
CWE-779 ChildOf CWE-254	Category	CWE-699

Demonstrative Examples
None

Observed Examples

1. CVE-2007-0421 : server records a large amount of data to the server log when it receives malformed headers
2. CVE-2002-1154 : chain: application does not restrict access to front-end for updates, which allows attacker to fill the error log

For more examples, refer to CVE relations in the bottom box.

White Box Definitions
None

Black Box Definitions
None

Taxynomy Mappings
None

References:
None