Security vulnerabilities

Weak Password Policy Allows Account Creation with Email as Password

Title: Weak Password Policy Allows Use of Email Address as Password

Severity: Medium

Summary The application allows users to create an account using their email address as the password. This indicates that the password policy does not adequately enforce password complexity or prevent commonly guessable passwords.

Description During testing of the registration functionality, it was observed that the platform accepted a password identical to the user's email address

Using an email address as a password significantly weakens account security because email addresses are often publicly known or easily obtainable. Attackers performing credential guessing or password spraying attacks may successfully compromise accounts protected by such weak passwords.

Steps to Reproduce Navigate to the registration page:
https://www.alwaysdata.com/en/register/ Enter a valid email address:
ashusachin01@gmail.com Use the exact same value as the password:
ashusachin01@gmail.com Complete the remaining required fields.
Submit the registration form.
Observe that the account creation request is accepted without enforcing stronger password requirements.

Proof of Concept
Email: ashusachin01@gmail.com Password: ashusachin01@gmail.com The application accepts the password even though it matches the account email address.

Impact :
Users may create accounts with highly predictable passwords.
Increased risk of credential stuffing and password spraying attacks.
Greater likelihood of unauthorized account access.
Reduced overall account security posture.
Expected Behavior
The application should reject passwords that:

Match the user's email address.
Contain the email address in whole or in part.
Are commonly guessable or predictable.
Do not meet minimum complexity requirements.

Recommendation
Prevent users from using their email address as their password.
Implement password strength validation during registration.
Enforce minimum password requirements (length and complexity).
Integrate breached-password checks using services such as Have I Been Pwned Passwords API.
Provide users with clear guidance on creating strong passwords.

CWE
CWE-521: Weak Password Requirements

OWASP
OWASP Top 10 2021 – A07: Identification and Authentication Failures

Evidence: Registration form accepted a password identical to the email address used during account creation.

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