Overview
In the evolving landscape of cybersecurity, new vulnerabilities continue to be uncovered in various software systems. The latest in this line is CVE-2025-58447, a critical buffer overflow vulnerability found in rAthena, an open-source cross-platform massively multiplayer online role playing game server. This vulnerability could potentially allow a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on the server or cause a system crash, leading to a possible denial of service. Given the popularity of MMORPGs and the critical nature of this vulnerability, it is imperative that users and administrators immediately implement the necessary mitigation steps.
Vulnerability Summary
CVE ID: CVE-2025-58447
Severity: Critical (CVSS: 9.8)
Attack Vector: Network
Privileges Required: None
User Interaction: None
Impact: System compromise, potential data leakage, and denial of service
Affected Products
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Product | Affected Versions
rAthena | Prior to commit 2f5248b
How the Exploit Works
The vulnerability resides in the login server of rAthena. By sending a specially crafted `CA_SSO_LOGIN_REQ` with an oversized token length, an attacker can cause a heap-based buffer overflow. This overflow allows the attacker to overwrite adjacent session fields, leading to immediate denial of service due to a system crash. Moreover, the attacker could potentially achieve remote code execution via heap corruption, leading to system compromise and possible data leakage.
Conceptual Example Code
As a conceptual illustration of how an attacker might exploit this vulnerability, consider the following pseudocode:
POST /login HTTP/1.1
Host: target.example.com
Content-Type: application/json
{ "CA_SSO_LOGIN_REQ": "AAA...[oversized token]" }In this pseudo request, the “CA_SSO_LOGIN_REQ” field is filled with an oversized token, which could trigger the heap-based buffer overflow and potentially lead to remote code execution or a system crash.
To mitigate the impact of this vulnerability, it is advised to apply the vendor patch or use a Web Application Firewall (WAF) or an Intrusion Detection System (IDS) as a temporary solution. However, these are only stop-gap measures and applying the vendor patch is the most effective solution to fully address this vulnerability.
