Node and EVM - Taraxa

Prepared by:

HALBORN

Last Updated 04/26/2024

Date of Engagement by: June 1st, 2022 - August 31st, 2022

Summary

0% of all REPORTED Findings have been addressed

All findings

Critical

High

Medium

Low

Informational

1. INTRODUCTION

Taraxa engaged Halborn to conduct a security assessment on taraxa-node and Taraxa-EVM codebase from June 1st, 2022 to August 31st.

2. AUDIT SUMMARY

The team at Halborn was provided a timeline for the engagement and assigned two full-time security engineers to audit the security of the assets in scope. The engineers are blockchain and smart contract security experts with advanced penetration testing, smart contract hacking, and in-depth knowledge of multiple blockchain protocols.

The purpose of this audit is to achieve the following:

Identify potential security issues within taraxa-node and Taraxa-EVM.

In summary, Halborn identified multiple security risks that were mostly addressed by the Taraxa team.

3. TEST APPROACH & METHODOLOGY

4. SCOPE

The assessment was scoped for the following projects details:

Taraxa-node (commit ID: d091acbb20853c629a8b04ea11dcf32241e1c897)
Taraxa-EVM (commit ID: a23dbf14f9cf8513f1bde13757e2d9b27cf2db8c)

The main particular components and libraries under review were: - RPC - P2P - Cryptography Signatures - Keys Management - Accounts and transactions - Consensus - Storage

5. RISK METHODOLOGY

Every vulnerability and issue observed by Halborn is ranked based on two sets of Metrics and a Severity Coefficient. This system is inspired by the industry standard Common Vulnerability Scoring System.

The two Metric sets are: Exploitability and Impact. Exploitability captures the ease and technical means by which vulnerabilities can be exploited and Impact describes the consequences of a successful exploit.

The Severity Coefficients is designed to further refine the accuracy of the ranking with two factors: Reversibility and Scope. These capture the impact of the vulnerability on the environment as well as the number of users and smart contracts affected.

The final score is a value between 0-10 rounded up to 1 decimal place and 10 corresponding to the highest security risk. This provides an objective and accurate rating of the severity of security vulnerabilities in smart contracts.

The system is designed to assist in identifying and prioritizing vulnerabilities based on their level of risk to address the most critical issues in a timely manner.

5.1 EXPLOITABILITY

Attack Origin (AO):

Captures whether the attack requires compromising a specific account.

Attack Cost (AC):

Captures the cost of exploiting the vulnerability incurred by the attacker relative to sending a single transaction on the relevant blockchain. Includes but is not limited to financial and computational cost.

Attack Complexity (AX):

Describes the conditions beyond the attacker’s control that must exist in order to exploit the vulnerability. Includes but is not limited to macro situation, available third-party liquidity and regulatory challenges.

Metrics:

EXPLOITABILIY METRIC ( $m_e$ )	METRIC VALUE	NUMERICAL VALUE
Attack Origin (AO)	Arbitrary (AO:A) Specific (AO:S)	1 0.2
Attack Cost (AC)	Low (AC:L) Medium (AC:M) High (AC:H)	1 0.67 0.33
Attack Complexity (AX)	Low (AX:L) Medium (AX:M) High (AX:H)	1 0.67 0.33

Exploitability

E

is calculated using the following formula:

$E = \prod m_e$

5.2 IMPACT

Confidentiality (C):

Measures the impact to the confidentiality of the information resources managed by the contract due to a successfully exploited vulnerability. Confidentiality refers to limiting access to authorized users only.

Integrity (I):

Measures the impact to integrity of a successfully exploited vulnerability. Integrity refers to the trustworthiness and veracity of data stored and/or processed on-chain. Integrity impact directly affecting Deposit or Yield records is excluded.

Availability (A):

Measures the impact to the availability of the impacted component resulting from a successfully exploited vulnerability. This metric refers to smart contract features and functionality, not state. Availability impact directly affecting Deposit or Yield is excluded.

Deposit (D):

Measures the impact to the deposits made to the contract by either users or owners.

Yield (Y):

Measures the impact to the yield generated by the contract for either users or owners.

Metrics:

IMPACT METRIC ( $m_I$ )	METRIC VALUE	NUMERICAL VALUE
Confidentiality (C)	None (I:N) Low (I:L) Medium (I:M) High (I:H) Critical (I:C)	0 0.25 0.5 0.75 1
Integrity (I)	None (I:N) Low (I:L) Medium (I:M) High (I:H) Critical (I:C)	0 0.25 0.5 0.75 1
Availability (A)	None (A:N) Low (A:L) Medium (A:M) High (A:H) Critical (A:C)	0 0.25 0.5 0.75 1
Deposit (D)	None (D:N) Low (D:L) Medium (D:M) High (D:H) Critical (D:C)	0 0.25 0.5 0.75 1
Yield (Y)	None (Y:N) Low (Y:L) Medium (Y:M) High (Y:H) Critical (Y:C)	0 0.25 0.5 0.75 1

Impact

I

is calculated using the following formula:

$I = max(m_I) + \frac{\sum{m_I} - max(m_I)}{4}$

5.3 SEVERITY COEFFICIENT

Reversibility (R):

Describes the share of the exploited vulnerability effects that can be reversed. For upgradeable contracts, assume the contract private key is available.

Scope (S):

Captures whether a vulnerability in one vulnerable contract impacts resources in other contracts.

Metrics:

SEVERITY COEFFICIENT ( $C$ )	COEFFICIENT VALUE	NUMERICAL VALUE
Reversibility ( $r$ )	None (R:N) Partial (R:P) Full (R:F)	1 0.5 0.25
Scope ( $s$ )	Changed (S:C) Unchanged (S:U)	1.25 1

Severity Coefficient

C

is obtained by the following product:

$C = rs$

The Vulnerability Severity Score

S

is obtained by:

$S = min(10, EIC * 10)$

The score is rounded up to 1 decimal places.

Severity	Score Value Range
Critical	9 - 10
High	7 - 8.9
Medium	4.5 - 6.9
Low	2 - 4.4
Informational	0 - 1.9

6. SCOPE

Out-of-Scope: New features/implementations after the remediation commit IDs.

7. Assessment Summary & Findings Overview

Critical

High

Medium

Low

Informational

Security analysis	Risk level	Remediation Date
VOTES - DENIAL OF SERVICE	Informational	-
RPC - NO AUTHENTICATION REQUIRED	Informational	-
BLOCK QUEUE WARNING WILL BLOCK INSTEAD OF WARNING	Informational	-
UNFILTERED PARAMETER ALLOWED TO EXECUTE COMMANDS ON THE HOST	Informational	-
LACK OF RETURN ERROR	Informational	-
LACK OF SIZE CHECK - OUT-OF-BOUNDS	Informational	-
INCORRECT `NIL` VALUE RETURNED ON AN ERROR	Informational	-
MULTIPLE OUTDATED MODULES	Informational	-
ERROR VALUE EVALUATED BUT NOT APPLIED	Informational	-
NO `ERR` VARIABLE EVALUATION PRIOR TO AN OPERATION	Informational	-
IMPLICIT MEMORY ALIASING IN LOOP	Informational	-
LACK OF DEFAULT CLAUSE ON SWITCH STATEMENT	Informational	-
INSECURE RANDOM NUMBER GENERATOR	Informational	-
COMPARE INSTEAD OF EQUAL	Informational	-
MULTIPLE TO-DO COMMENTS FOUND ON THE CODE	Informational	-

Impact:
Likelihood:

Halborn strongly recommends conducting a follow-up assessment of the project either within six months or immediately following any material changes to the codebase, whichever comes first. This approach is crucial for maintaining the project’s integrity and addressing potential vulnerabilities introduced by code modifications.

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Node and EVM

Taraxa

Table of Contents

1. INTRODUCTION

2. AUDIT SUMMARY

3. TEST APPROACH & METHODOLOGY

4. SCOPE

5. RISK METHODOLOGY

5.1 EXPLOITABILITY

Attack Origin (AO):

Attack Cost (AC):

Attack Complexity (AX):

Metrics:

5.2 IMPACT

Confidentiality (C):

Integrity (I):

Availability (A):

Deposit (D):

Yield (Y):

Metrics:

5.3 SEVERITY COEFFICIENT

Reversibility (R):

Scope (S):

Metrics:

6. SCOPE

7. Assessment Summary & Findings Overview

8. Findings & Tech Details

8.1 VOTES - DENIAL OF SERVICE

Description

Score

8.2 RPC - NO AUTHENTICATION REQUIRED

Description

Score

8.3 BLOCK QUEUE WARNING WILL BLOCK INSTEAD OF WARNING

Description

Score

8.4 UNFILTERED PARAMETER ALLOWED TO EXECUTE COMMANDS ON THE HOST

Description

Score

8.5 LACK OF RETURN ERROR

Description

Score

8.6 LACK OF SIZE CHECK - OUT-OF-BOUNDS

Description

Score

8.7 INCORRECT `NIL` VALUE RETURNED ON AN ERROR

Description

Score

8.8 MULTIPLE OUTDATED MODULES

Description

Score

8.9 ERROR VALUE EVALUATED BUT NOT APPLIED

Description

Score

8.10 NO `ERR` VARIABLE EVALUATION PRIOR TO AN OPERATION

Description

Score

8.11 IMPLICIT MEMORY ALIASING IN LOOP

Description

Score

8.12 LACK OF DEFAULT CLAUSE ON SWITCH STATEMENT

Description

Score

8.13 INSECURE RANDOM NUMBER GENERATOR

Description

Score

8.14 COMPARE INSTEAD OF EQUAL

Description

Score

8.15 MULTIPLE TO-DO COMMENTS FOUND ON THE CODE

Description

Score

Table of Contents