CVE-2024-12345: The Ghost in the Shell – Anatomy of a Canary CVE

Every now and then, a CVE ID drops that looks too good to be true. Enter CVE-2024-12345. Yes, that is the actual ID. It sounds like the combination an idiot would have on his luggage, or perhaps the default password for a router from 1999. The affected product? INW Krbyyyzo 25.2002. If you try to pronounce "Krbyyyzo" out loud, you might accidentally summon a daemon or reboot your modem.

According to the official paperwork, this software runs a component called the "Daily Huddle Site." The vulnerability resides in a file named /gbo.aspx. It paints a picture of a legacy ASP.NET enterprise app that hasn't seen a compiler since the dot-com bubble burst.

But here is where the story gets weird. There is no vendor website. There is no documentation. There are no angry sysadmins on Reddit complaining about the Krbyyyzo update breaking their coffee machines. This isn't just a vulnerability; it's a glitch in the matrix. It's a ghost story written in CVSS vectors.

Let's suspend our disbelief for a moment and treat this as a real target. The vulnerability is classified as CWE-400: Uncontrolled Resource Consumption. In the hacker lexicon, we call this the "Client-Side Nuke." The flaw allegedly exists in the s parameter of the gbo.aspx endpoint.

Resource consumption bugs are beautiful in their simplicity. They don't require complex memory corruption or ROP chains. They rely on the application doing exactly what it was told to do, just too much of it. The application logic likely takes user input and uses it to define the size of an array, the number of iterations in a loop, or the complexity of a database query.

When a developer trusts the client to say "I need X amount of stuff," and the attacker replies with "I need 9 billion terrabytes of stuff," the server usually responds by curling into a ball and crying. It's an asymmetry of effort: one HTTP packet from me costs you 100% of your CPU.

Since "INW Krbyyyzo" doesn't actually exist in any known repository, we can't git blame the developer. However, based on the attack vector (ASP.NET, parameter s, Resource Consumption), we can reconstruct exactly what this code would look like if it were real. It’s a perfect example of bad coding practices.

Here is a forensic reconstruction of the vulnerable gbo.aspx.cs:

protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    // VULNERABLE CODE
    string s = Request.QueryString["s"];
    
    if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(s))
    {
        // The fatal flaw: Trusting user input for allocation
        int count = int.Parse(s);
        
        // Goodbye, Heap Memory
        List<string> huddleNotes = new List<string>();
        for(int i = 0; i &lt; count; i++) {
             huddleNotes.Add("Meeting note " + i);
        }
    }
}

The fix is trivial. You simply don't let the user drive the bus. You cap the input, validate the range, or better yet, paginate the data so you never allocate more than a fixed buffer size.

// MITIGATED CODE
int count = 0;
if (int.TryParse(Request.QueryString["s"], out count))
{
    // Enforce a sanity limit
    const int MAX_ITEMS = 50;
    if (count > MAX_ITEMS) count = MAX_ITEMS;
    
    // Proceed safely...
}

If you were to find a wild instance of the Daily Huddle Site (perhaps running on a server in the Bermuda Triangle), exploiting this would be trivial. We don't need Metasploit. We don't need Cobalt Strike. We need curl.

The attack vector is local (AV:L), implying you might need low-level access, but the web-based nature of .aspx suggests a remote possibility if the service is misconfigured. The exploit is simply a math problem.

# The "Infinite Huddle" Attack
# Causes the server to attempt an allocation of INT_MAX objects
 
curl -v "http://localhost/gbo.aspx?s=2147483647"

When this request hits the IIS worker process (w3wp.exe), the .NET Garbage Collector panics. The server attempts to expand the heap to accommodate the massive list. Memory spikes, the page file thrashes, and eventually, the application pool recycles or the server halts. It is a denial of service via bureaucracy.

Now for the cold shower. This vulnerability is almost certainly fake.

The indicators are blindingly obvious to a trained eye. First, the CVE ID 2024-12345 is a sequence used in textbooks, not the chaotic randomness of real assignment. Second, "Krbyyyzo" is a nonsense string likely generated to be unique—a "Google Whack" term that returns zero results unless you are looking at this specific database entry.

[!NOTE] Why do this? CNAs (CVE Numbering Authorities) and threat intel firms often insert "Canary Entries" or "Honeypot CVEs" into their feeds. This allows them to track who is scraping their data without a license.

If you see a security vendor selling a "Protection Shield" for INW Krbyyyzo, you know immediately that their product is snake oil. They are just ingesting raw CVE feeds and generating signatures for products that don't exist. It exposes the laziness of the automated vulnerability management industry. This CVE isn't a bug in code; it's a bug in the security ecosystem.