#39524 [SC-Insight] Incorrect Outcome Formatting in Reality Adapter Leads to Wrong Number of Outcomes

Submitted on Jan 31st 2025 at 21:39:28 UTC by @NHristov for Audit Comp | Butter

• Report ID: #39524

• Report Type: Smart Contract

• Report severity: Insight

• Target: https://github.com/immunefi-team/audit-comp-butter-cfm-v1

• Impacts:

  • Protocol insolvency

Description

Brief/Intro

When outcome names are passed as an array to the Reality adapter, they are transformed into a comma-separated string with quotation marks. The current string-format logic can incorrectly parse or escape quotes. This can cause Reality.eth to interpret outcomes differently than intended, resulting in extra outcomes in the question.

Vulnerability Details

The vulnerability is in the FlatCFMRealityAdapter::_formatDecisionQuestionParams function. This function formats an array of outcome names into a JSON-like string for Reality.eth. If the outcome names contain special characters like commas with quotes, the formatted string may be misinterpreted by Reality.eth, leading to an incorrect number of outcomes.

function _formatDecisionQuestionParams(FlatCFMQuestionParams calldata flatCFMQuestionParams)
        private
        pure
        returns (string memory)
    {
        bytes memory formattedOutcomes = abi.encodePacked('"', flatCFMQuestionParams.outcomeNames[0], '"');
        for (uint256 i = 1; i < flatCFMQuestionParams.outcomeNames.length; i++) {
            formattedOutcomes = abi.encodePacked(formattedOutcomes, ',"', flatCFMQuestionParams.outcomeNames[i], '"');
        }
        return string(abi.encodePacked(formattedOutcomes));
    }

Example:

Input outcome names: ["Like Two "C", "B"", "No"] Formatted string: "Like Two "C", "B"","No" Reality.eth interprets this as three outcomes: "Like Two ", "C", "B"","No"

Impact Details

Incorrect Outcome Count: Reality.eth may interpret the formatted string as having more or fewer outcomes than intended. Invalid Market Configuration: The conditional tokens may be configured incorrectly, leading to invalid market behavior.

References

https://github.com/immunefi-team/audit-comp-butter-cfm-v1/blob/045ab0ec86fd9a3f7cd0b0cd4068d75c46d2e316/src/FlatCFMRealityAdapter.sol#L84-L94

https://github.com/immunefi-team/audit-comp-butter-cfm-v1/blob/045ab0ec86fd9a3f7cd0b0cd4068d75c46d2e316/src/FlatCFMRealityAdapter.sol#L109C5-L130C6

https://github.com/immunefi-team/audit-comp-butter-cfm-v1/blob/045ab0ec86fd9a3f7cd0b0cd4068d75c46d2e316/src/FlatCFMRealityAdapter.sol#L109C5-L130C6

Proof of Concept

The following code snippet can be appended at the bottom of the AskQuestionTest contract in FlatCFMRealityAdapter.t.sol

    event QuestionAsked(string question);

    function testAskDecisionQuestionWithOutcomesContainingInvalidChars() public {
        FlatCFMQuestionParams memory flatCFMQuestionParams =
            FlatCFMQuestionParams({outcomeNames: new string[](2), openingTime: uint32(block.timestamp + 1000)});
        flatCFMQuestionParams.outcomeNames[0] = "Like Two \"C\", \"B\"";
        flatCFMQuestionParams.outcomeNames[1] = "No";

        vm.expectEmit(true, false, false, true, address(reality));

        emit QuestionAsked("\"Like Two \"C\", \"B\"\",\"No\"");
        realityAdapter.askDecisionQuestion(decisionTemplateId, flatCFMQuestionParams);
    }

Also, the reality eth dummy contract should emit the appropriate event with the question data so we need to override the askQuestionWithMinBod as this

    event QuestionAsked(string question);

    function askQuestionWithMinBond(
        uint256 template_id,
        string memory question,
        address arbitrator,
        uint32 timeout,
        uint32 opening_ts,
        uint256 nonce,
        uint256 min_bond
    ) external payable virtual returns (bytes32) {
        bytes32 content_hash = keccak256(abi.encodePacked(template_id, opening_ts, question));
        bytes32 question_id =
            keccak256(abi.encodePacked(content_hash, arbitrator, timeout, min_bond, address(this), msg.sender, nonce));
        require(questions[question_id].timeout == 0, "question must not exist");
        questions[question_id].content_hash = content_hash;
        questions[question_id].arbitrator = arbitrator;
        questions[question_id].opening_ts = opening_ts;
        questions[question_id].timeout = timeout;

        emit QuestionAsked(question);
        return question_id;
    }

Run the test snippet with forge test --mt testAskDecisionQuestionWithOutcomesContainingInvalidChars