COMMON WEAKNESS ENUMERATIONDraft

CWE-1193

Power-On of Untrusted Execution Core Before Enabling Fabric Access Control

The product enables components that contain untrusted firmware before memory and fabric access controls have been enabled.

Abstraction

Base

Structure

Simple

Likelihood of Exploit

Medium

Understand the problem

What is the problem?

The product enables components that contain untrusted firmware before memory and fabric access controls have been enabled.

Extended description

After initial reset, System-on-Chip (SoC) fabric access controls and other security features need to be programmed by trusted firmware as part of the boot sequence. If untrusted IPs or peripheral microcontrollers are enabled first, then the untrusted component can master transactions on the hardware bus and target memory or other assets to compromise the SoC boot firmware.

Root cause

How and when does the problem arise?

Lifecycle phase

Architecture and Design

Risk

What does successful exploitation lead to?

Bypass Protection Mechanism

Affected security scopes: Access Control

An untrusted component can master transactions on the HW bus and target memory or other assets to compromise the SoC boot firmware.

Defence

How is it prevented and fixed?

Architecture and Design

Architecture and design approach

Detail
The boot sequence should enable fabric access controls and memory protections before enabling third-party hardware IPs and peripheral microcontrollers that use untrusted firmware.