CAPEC Details
Name Token Impersonation
Likelyhood of attack Typical severity
Low Medium
Summary An adversary exploits a weakness in authentication to create an access token (or equivalent) that impersonates a different entity, and then associates a process/thread to that that impersonated token. This action causes a downstream user to make a decision or take action that is based on the assumed identity, and not the response that blocks the adversary.
Prerequisites This pattern of attack is only applicable when a downstream user leverages tokens to verify identity, and then takes action based on that identity.
Solutions
Related Weaknesses
CWE ID Description
CWE-287 Improper Authentication
CWE-1270 Generation of Incorrect Security Tokens
Related CAPECS
CAPEC ID Description
CAPEC-194 An adversary takes advantage of improper authentication to provide data or services under a falsified identity. The purpose of using the falsified identity may be to prevent traceability of the provided data or to assume the rights granted to another individual. One of the simplest forms of this attack would be the creation of an email message with a modified "From" field in order to appear that the message was sent from someone other than the actual sender. The root of the attack (in this case the email system) fails to properly authenticate the source and this results in the reader incorrectly performing the instructed action. Results of the attack vary depending on the details of the attack, but common results include privilege escalation, obfuscation of other attacks, and data corruption/manipulation.
Taxonomy: ATTACK
Entry ID Entry Name
1134 Access Token Manipulation