CWE-410

Insufficient Resource Pool

Weakness Description

The product's resource pool is not large enough to handle peak demand, which allows an attacker to prevent others from accessing the resource by using a (relatively) large number of requests for resources.

Frequently the consequence is a "flood" of connection or sessions.

Potential Mitigations

Architecture and Design

Do not perform resource-intensive transactions for unauthenticated users and/or invalid requests.

Architecture and Design

Consider implementing a velocity check mechanism which would detect abusive behavior.

Operation

Consider load balancing as an option to handle heavy loads.

Implementation

Make sure that resource handles are properly closed when no longer needed.

Architecture and Design

Identify the system's resource intensive operations and consider protecting them from abuse (e.g. malicious automated script which runs the resources out).

Common Consequences

AvailabilityIntegrityOther
DoS: Crash, Exit, or RestartOther

Floods often cause a crash or other problem besides denial of the resource itself; these are likely examples of *other* vulnerabilities, not an insufficient resource pool.

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