Using Vulnerable Libraries

Why is this important?

Most of the code for modern applications is coming from third-party libraries. This is great because it speeds up development. However, there is no guarantee that third-party libraries are secure and of high quality.

As a result, over 500 vulnerabilities were reported in Ruby and Rails related gems.

Check out this video for a high-level explanation:

Updating Vulnerable Libraries

Option A: Manually update the packages

1. Look at the vulnerable package in the GuardRails PR comment.
2. Identify if a fixed version is available and your Gemfile doesn't have conflicting constraints.

  # Resolve constraint that prevent updating to a fixed version
  # For example, this would prevent you from upgrading to Rails 5.2.0
  gem 'rails', '~> 5.1.6'

3. Once you know that the update can be done, run the according command:

  # Attempt a patch-level only (--patch) update to the Gemfile.lock
  # with as minimal effect on other gems as possible
  bundle update --patch --conservative <vulnerable-gem-name>
  # Update gems to latest minor version
  bundle update --minor --strict
  # Update gems to latest major version
  bundle update --major

3. Test to verify that the upgrade doesn't break the app.
4. Ship it 🚢 and relax 🌴

Option B: When no update is available

1. Look at the vulnerable package in the GuardRails PR comment.
2. If no update is available then you have 3 choices:
   • Remove the package if it's not needed
   • Replace the package with another one that doesn't contain vulnerabilities
   • Take a closer look at the vulnerability details and create a PR patching it.
3. Test to verify that your actions don't break the app.
4. Ship it 🚢 and relax 🌴

More information:

• OWASP TOP 10 Reference: Using Components with Known Vulnerabilities
• Using Bundle Update
• Updating Gems Cheat Sheet