CWE-1332 Base Stable

Improper Handling of Faults that Lead to Instruction Skips

This vulnerability occurs when a hardware device lacks or incorrectly implements the necessary circuitry or sensors to detect and respond to the skipping of critical security instructions during CPU…

Definition

What is CWE-1332?

This vulnerability occurs when a hardware device lacks or incorrectly implements the necessary circuitry or sensors to detect and respond to the skipping of critical security instructions during CPU execution.
Hardware can behave unpredictably under certain operating conditions, such as during electrical disturbances or when pushed beyond its normal specifications. These conditions can cause the CPU to skip crucial security instructions, effectively bypassing the logic they were meant to enforce. In practice, this often targets single conditional branch instructions that control security decisions—like password verification or firmware authentication—flipping the intended outcome if skipped. Attackers exploit this by using fault injection techniques to deliberately induce these unstable operating conditions, making instruction skips happen more reliably and frequently than they would naturally. This allows them to manipulate security-critical decision points, such as bypassing authentication checks or altering firmware validation processes.
Real-world impact

Real-world CVEs caused by CWE-1332

  • CVE-2019-15894

    fault injection attack bypasses the verification mode, potentially allowing arbitrary code execution.

How attackers exploit it

Step-by-step attacker path

  1. 1

    Identify a code path that handles untrusted input without validation.

  2. 2

    Craft a payload that exercises the unsafe behavior — injection, traversal, overflow, or logic abuse.

  3. 3

    Deliver the payload through a normal request and observe the application's reaction.

  4. 4

    Iterate until the response leaks data, executes attacker code, or escalates privileges.

Vulnerable code example

Vulnerable Other

A smart card contains authentication credentials that are used as authorization to enter a building. The credentials are only accessible when a correct PIN is presented to the card.

Vulnerable Other 
The card emits the credentials when a voltage anomaly is injected into the power line to the device at a particular time after providing an incorrect PIN to the card, causing the internal program to accept the incorrect PIN.
Secure code example

Secure Other

There are several ways this weakness could be fixed.

Secure Other 
- add an internal filter or internal power supply in series with the power supply pin on the device

  - add sensing circuitry to reset the device if out of tolerance conditions are detected

  - add additional execution sensing circuits to monitor the execution order for anomalies and abort the action or reset the device under fault conditions
What changed: the unsafe sink is replaced (or the input is validated/escaped) so the same payload no longer triggers the weakness.
Prevention checklist

How to prevent CWE-1332

  • Architecture and Design Design strategies for ensuring safe failure if inputs, such as Vcc, are modified out of acceptable ranges.
  • Architecture and Design Design strategies for ensuring safe behavior if instructions attempt to be skipped.
  • Architecture and Design Identify mission critical secrets that should be wiped if faulting is detected, and design a mechanism to do the deletion.
  • Implementation Add redundancy by performing an operation multiple times, either in space or time, and perform majority voting. Additionally, make conditional instruction timing unpredictable.
  • Implementation Use redundant operations or canaries to detect and respond to faults.
  • Implementation Ensure that fault mitigations are strong enough in practice. For example, a low power detection mechanism that takes 50 clock cycles to trigger at lower voltages may be an insufficient security mechanism if the instruction counter has already progressed with no other CPU activity occurring.
Detection signals

How to detect CWE-1332

Automated Static Analysis Moderate

This weakness can be found using automated static analysis once a developer has indicated which code paths are critical to protect.

Simulation / Emulation Moderate

This weakness can be found using automated dynamic analysis. Both emulation of a CPU with instruction skips, as well as RTL simulation of a CPU IP, can indicate parts of the code that are sensitive to faults due to instruction skips.

Manual Analysis Moderate

This weakness can be found using manual (static) analysis. The analyst has security objectives that are matched against the high-level code. This method is less precise than emulation, especially if the analysis is done at the higher level language rather than at assembly level.

Plexicus auto-fix

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Frequently asked questions

Frequently asked questions

What is CWE-1332?

This vulnerability occurs when a hardware device lacks or incorrectly implements the necessary circuitry or sensors to detect and respond to the skipping of critical security instructions during CPU execution.

How serious is CWE-1332?

MITRE has not published a likelihood-of-exploit rating for this weakness. Treat it as medium-impact until your threat model proves otherwise.

What languages or platforms are affected by CWE-1332?

MITRE lists the following affected platforms: Not OS-Specific, Not Architecture-Specific, System on Chip.

How can I prevent CWE-1332?

Design strategies for ensuring safe failure if inputs, such as Vcc, are modified out of acceptable ranges. Design strategies for ensuring safe behavior if instructions attempt to be skipped.

How does Plexicus detect and fix CWE-1332?

Plexicus's SAST engine matches the data-flow signature for CWE-1332 on every commit. When a match is found, our Codex Remedium agent opens a fix PR with the corrected code, tests, and a one-line summary for the reviewer.

Where can I learn more about CWE-1332?

MITRE publishes the canonical definition at https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/1332.html. You can also reference OWASP and NIST documentation for adjacent guidance.

Related weaknesses

Weaknesses related to CWE-1332

CWE-1384 Parent

Improper Handling of Physical or Environmental Conditions

This weakness occurs when a hardware device fails to manage unexpected physical or environmental situations, whether they happen naturally…

CWE-1247 Sibling

Improper Protection Against Voltage and Clock Glitches

This vulnerability occurs when a hardware device lacks proper physical safeguards against deliberate electrical manipulation. Without…

CWE-1261 Sibling

Improper Handling of Single Event Upsets

This vulnerability occurs when hardware logic fails to properly manage single-event upsets (SEUs), which are temporary bit flips caused by…

CWE-1351 Sibling

Improper Handling of Hardware Behavior in Exceptionally Cold Environments

This weakness occurs when a hardware device or its firmware lacks proper safeguards to maintain security functions when operated in…

Resources

Further reading

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