COMMON WEAKNESS ENUMERATIONIncomplete

CWE-842

Placement of User into Incorrect Group

The product or the administrator places a user into an incorrect group.

Abstraction

Base

Structure

Simple

Likelihood of Exploit

Medium

Understand the problem

What is the problem?

The product or the administrator places a user into an incorrect group.

Extended description

If the incorrect group has more access or privileges than the intended group, the user might be able to bypass intended security policy to access unexpected resources or perform unexpected actions. The access-control system might not be able to detect malicious usage of this group membership.

Root cause

How and when does the problem arise?

Lifecycle phase

Implementation

Lifecycle phase

Operation

Risk

What does successful exploitation lead to?

Gain Privileges or Assume Identity

Affected security scopes: Access Control

Defence

How is it prevented and fixed?

  • Follow secure coding guidelines for input handling and boundary checking.
  • Enforce strict security reviews and automated static analysis (SAST) checks.