CAPEC-231
Oversized Serialized Data Payloads
An adversary injects oversized serialized data payloads into a parser during data processing to produce adverse effects upon the parser such as exhausting system resources and arbitrary code execution.
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Applications often need to transform data in and out of serialized data formats, such as XML and YAML, by using a data parser. It may be possible for an adversary to inject data that may have an adverse effect on the parser when it is being processed. By supplying oversized payloads in input vectors that will be processed by the parser, an adversary can cause the parser to consume more resources while processing, causing excessive memory consumption and CPU utilization, and potentially cause execution of arbitrary code. An adversary's goal is to leverage parser failure to their advantage. DoS is most closely associated with web services, SOAP, and Rest, because remote service requesters can post malicious data payloads to the service provider designed to exhaust the service provider's memory, CPU, and/or disk space. This attack exploits the loosely coupled nature of web services, where the service provider has little to no control over the service requester and any messages the service requester sends.
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Explain the attack pattern CAPEC-231: Oversized Serialized Data Payloads: how it unfolds, what it needs and how to prevent and detect it in my systems. Use https://capec.mitre.org/data/definitions/231.html and https://cve.bz/cve/capec/231?via=ask-ai-copy, which lists recent CVEs with the weaknesses it exploits. Cite the sources.Opens a third-party assistant; its answer is its own, not cve.bz's. The prompt holds only this attack pattern's id and public links.
How the attack unfolds
Explore
The attacker looks for a way in.
An adversary determines the input data stream that is being processed by an serialized data parser on the victim's side.
Experiment
They probe what they found.
An adversary crafts input data that may have an adverse effect on the operation of the data parser when the data is parsed on the victim's system.
Prerequisites
An application uses an parser for serialized data to perform transformation on user-controllable data.
An application does not perform sufficient validation to ensure that user-controllable data is safe for a data parser.
Skills required
- Low skill
Denial of service
- High skill
Arbitrary code execution
Signs of an attack
Bad data is passed to the serialized data parser (possibly repeatedly), possibly making it crash or execute arbitrary code.
Consequences
| Impact | Affects | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Resource Consumption | Availability | |
| Read Data | Confidentiality | |
| Execute Unauthorized Commands | Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability | |
| Gain Privileges | Confidentiality, Access Control, Authorization |
Mitigations
Carefully validate and sanitize all user-controllable serialized data prior to passing it to the parser routine. Ensure that the resultant data is safe to pass to the parser.
Perform validation on canonical data.
Pick a robust implementation of the serialized data parser.
Validate data against a valid schema or DTD prior to parsing.
Weaknesses it exploits
- CWE-20 Improper Input Validation
- CWE-112 Missing XML Validation
- CWE-674 Uncontrolled Recursion
- CWE-770 Allocation of Resources Without Limits or Throttling
Recent CVEs with these weaknesses
- –CVE-2026-86531
The embedded OpenEJB HTTP server does not limit the size of incoming request bodies or of multipart requests, and does not remove the temporary files it creates for multipart parts. A remote unauthenticated attacker can cause excessive mem…
- 9.6CVE-2026-108186
Improper Input Validation in Zoom Workplace for Windows may allow an unauthenticated user to conduct an escalation of privilege via network access.
- 4.9CVE-2026-105427
Improper input validation in Ivanti EPMM before version 12.10.0.1, 12.9.0.3, and 12.8.0.5 allows a remote authenticated attacker with admin privileges to permanently disable all Apache HTTPS services resulting in denial of service.
- 6.7CVE-2026-105426
Improper input validation in Ivanti EPMM before version 12.10.0.1, 12.9.0.3, and 12.8.0.5 allows a remote authenticated attacker with admin privileges to set arbitrary Linux kernel parameters as root.
- 4.3CVE-2026-123178
An insufficient input validation vulnerability in the listed NETGEAR Orbi Models router allows an authenticated administrator connected to the local network to execute unauthorized commands and modify the router’s software and functionalit…
- 7.0CVE-2026-114359
Eclipse Kura downloads deployment packages (DPs) from a remote URL without any limit on the size of the data it receives. A malicious or compromised HTTP(S) server, or an attacker able to tamper with a plain-HTTP download, can stream an ar…
- 6.3CVE-2026-125871
The sourcecache expansion module in MISP Modules (misp-modules) contains a Server-Side Request Forgery (SSRF) vulnerability. When a user with permission to create or modify attributes of type 'link' or 'url' submits an attribute value, the…
- 5.5CVE-2026-125703
A flaw was found in the GStreamer gst-plugins-bad MXF plugin. Insufficient bounds checks when parsing crafted VANC data can cause an out-of-bounds read in the demuxer, while an incorrect buffer size calculation when muxing multiple ancilla…
The newest records naming one of them. Each weakness's page lists them all.
Related attack patterns
- Part of
- CAPEC-130 Excessive Allocation
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