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pickle — load

Deserialization of Untrusted Data in pickle Module

The Python pickle module is a serialization module that can be used to serialize and deserialize Python objects. However, pickle is not a secure serialization format and should not be used to serialize sensitive data.

Pickle is not secure because it can be used to deserialize malicious code. For example, an attacker could create a pickle file that contains malicious code and then trick a user into opening the file. When the user opens the file, the malicious code would be executed.

Example

pickle_loads.py
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import pickle


def load_pickle_file(file_path):
    with open(file_path, 'rb') as file:
        data = file.read()

    # WARNING: Unpickle data without proper validation
    obj = pickle.loads(data)
    return obj

# Example usage (assuming 'malicious.pickle' contains malicious code)
pickle_file = 'malicious.pickle'
loaded_object = load_pickle_file(pickle_file)
Example Output 
> precli tests/unit/rules/python/stdlib/pickle/examples/pickle_loads.py
⚠️  Warning on line 9 in tests/unit/rules/python/stdlib/pickle/examples/pickle_loads.py
PY013: Deserialization of Untrusted Data
Potential unsafe usage of 'pickle.loads' that can allow instantiation of arbitrary objects.

Remediation

Consider signing data with hmac if you need to ensure that pickle data has not been tampered with.

Alternatively if you need to serialize sensitive data, you could use a secure serialization format, such as JSON or XML. These formats are designed to be secure and cannot be used to execute malicious code.

Default Configuration

enabled = true
level = "warning"

See also

Info

New in version 0.1.0