While adding general comments is very useful, some programmers tend to leave important data, such as: filenames related to the web application, old links or links which were not meant to be browsed by users, old code fragments, etc.
View on MITREAn attacker who finds these comments can map the application's structure and files, expose hidden parts of the site, and study the fragments of code to reverse engineer the application, which may help develop further attacks against the site.
Remove comments which have sensitive information about the design/implementation of the application. Some of the comments may be exposed to the user and affect the security posture of the application.
No detection method information available for this CWE.
The following comment, embedded in a JSP, will be displayed in the resulting HTML output.
CWE-615: Inclusion of Sensitive Information in Source Code Comments is a Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE) entry maintained by MITRE. While adding general comments is very useful, some programmers tend to leave important data, such as: filenames related to the web application, old links or links which were not meant to be browsed by users, old code fragments, etc. An attacker who finds these comments can map the application's structure and files, expose hidden parts of the site, and study the fragments of code to reverse engineer the application, which may help develop further attacks against the site.
If exploited, CWE-615 (Inclusion of Sensitive Information in Source Code Comments) it can compromise Confidentiality, leading to outcomes such as Read Application Data.
Recommended mitigations for CWE-615 include: Remove comments which have sensitive information about the design/implementation of the application. Some of the comments may be exposed to the user and affect the security posture of the application.
MITRE documents real CVEs mapped to CWE-615, including CVE-2007-6197, CVE-2007-4072 and CVE-2009-2431. You can look up the full details of each CVE, including CVSS scores and remediation guidance, on our CVE Lookup tool.
A CWE (Common Weakness Enumeration) like CWE-615 describes a category of software weakness — the underlying flaw type. A CVE (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures) identifies a specific, real-world vulnerability in a particular product. In short, a CWE is the kind of mistake, and a CVE is an instance of that mistake being found in software.