Puppy Raffle

AI First Flight #1
Beginner FriendlyFoundrySolidityNFT
EXP
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Submission Details
Severity: medium
Valid

Denial of Service via Unbounded Gas Consumption in enterRaffle()

Root + Impact

The `PuppyRaffle::enterRaffle` function uses a nested loop to check for duplicate players, resulting in O(n²) time complexity. As the number of players grows, gas costs increase exponentially, eventually exceeding the block gas limit and making the function unusable.


Description

**Normal Behavior:** The `enterRaffle` function should allow new players to join the raffle by paying the entrance fee.

  • The duplicate checking mechanism iterates through all existing players for each new player, causing gas consumption to grow quadratically:

  • 10 players: ~476K gas

  • 1,100 players: ~1.05B gas (35x block limit)

Root cause in the codebase with @> marks to highlight the relevant section
function enterRaffle(address[] memory newPlayers) public payable {
require(msg.value == entranceFee * newPlayers.length, "PuppyRaffle: Must send enough to enter raffle");
for (uint256 i = 0; i < newPlayers.length; i++) {
players.push(newPlayers[i]);
}
// @> Check for duplicates - O(n²) complexity!
for (uint256 i = 0; i < players.length - 1; i++) {
for (uint256 j = i + 1; j < players.length; j++) {
require(players[i] != players[j], "PuppyRaffle: Duplicate player");
}
}
emit RaffleEnter(newPlayers);
}

Risk

Likelihood:

  • Reason 1: Attack requires minimal resources - attacker only needs to enter with many addresses once

  • Reason 2: No access control prevents this attack - anyone can trigger it

Impact:

  • Impact 1: Protocol becomes permanently unusable - no new players can enter

  • Impact 2: Funds of legitimate players may be locked in the contract

Proof of Concept

solidityfunction testDenialOfServiceEnteringRaffle() public {
// Setup: 1000 players enter
address[] memory players = new address[]();
for (uint256 i = 0; i < 1000; i++) {
players[i] = address(uint160(i + 1));
}
puppyRaffle.enterRaffle{value: entranceFee * 1000}(players);
// Attack: Try to enter 100 more players
address[] memory newPlayers = new address[]();
for (uint256 i = 0; i < 100; i++) {
newPlayers[i] = address(uint160(i + 1001));
}
// Result: OutOfGas error - transaction fails
puppyRaffle.enterRaffle{value: entranceFee * 100}(newPlayers);
}
```
**Test Results:**
```
[FAIL: EvmError: Revert] testDenialOfServiceEnteringRaffle() (gas: 1056951534)
└─ ← [OutOfGas] EvmError: OutOfGas

Recommended Mitigation

Replace the O(n²) nested loop with an O(1) mapping-based duplicate check:

+ // Add state variables
+ mapping(address => uint256) public addressToRaffleId;
+ uint256 public raffleId = 1;
function enterRaffle(address[] memory newPlayers) public payable {
require(msg.value == entranceFee * newPlayers.length, "PuppyRaffle: Must send enough to enter raffle");
for (uint256 i = 0; i < newPlayers.length; i++) {
players.push(newPlayers[i]);
+ require(addressToRaffleId[newPlayers[i]] != raffleId, "PuppyRaffle: Duplicate player");
+ addressToRaffleId[newPlayers[i]] = raffleId;
}
- // Remove O(n²) nested loop
- for (uint256 i = 0; i < players.length - 1; i++) {
- for (uint256 j = i + 1; j < players.length; j++) {
- require(players[i] != players[j], "PuppyRaffle: Duplicate player");
- }
- }
emit RaffleEnter(newPlayers);
}
function selectWinner() external {
// ... existing code ...
delete players;
raffleStartTime = block.timestamp;
previousWinner = winner;
+ raffleId++; // Reset for next raffle round
// ... rest of code ...
}
Updates

Lead Judging Commences

ai-first-flight-judge Lead Judge about 23 hours ago
Submission Judgement Published
Validated
Assigned finding tags:

[M-01] `PuppyRaffle: enterRaffle` Use of gas extensive duplicate check leads to Denial of Service, making subsequent participants to spend much more gas than prev ones to enter

## Description `enterRaffle` function uses gas inefficient duplicate check that causes leads to Denial of Service, making subsequent participants to spend much more gas than previous users to enter. ## Vulnerability Details In the `enterRaffle` function, to check duplicates, it loops through the `players` array. As the `player` array grows, it will make more checks, which leads the later user to pay more gas than the earlier one. More users in the Raffle, more checks a user have to make leads to pay more gas. ## Impact As the arrays grows significantly over time, it will make the function unusable due to block gas limit. This is not a fair approach and lead to bad user experience. ## POC In existing test suit, add this test to see the difference b/w gas for users. once added run `forge test --match-test testEnterRaffleIsGasInefficient -vvvvv` in terminal. you will be able to see logs in terminal. ```solidity function testEnterRaffleIsGasInefficient() public { vm.startPrank(owner); vm.txGasPrice(1); /// First we enter 100 participants uint256 firstBatch = 100; address[] memory firstBatchPlayers = new address[](firstBatch); for(uint256 i = 0; i < firstBatchPlayers; i++) { firstBatch[i] = address(i); } uint256 gasStart = gasleft(); puppyRaffle.enterRaffle{value: entranceFee * firstBatch}(firstBatchPlayers); uint256 gasEnd = gasleft(); uint256 gasUsedForFirstBatch = (gasStart - gasEnd) * txPrice; console.log("Gas cost of the first 100 partipants is:", gasUsedForFirstBatch); /// Now we enter 100 more participants uint256 secondBatch = 200; address[] memory secondBatchPlayers = new address[](secondBatch); for(uint256 i = 100; i < secondBatchPlayers; i++) { secondBatch[i] = address(i); } gasStart = gasleft(); puppyRaffle.enterRaffle{value: entranceFee * secondBatch}(secondBatchPlayers); gasEnd = gasleft(); uint256 gasUsedForSecondBatch = (gasStart - gasEnd) * txPrice; console.log("Gas cost of the next 100 participant is:", gasUsedForSecondBatch); vm.stopPrank(owner); } ``` ## Recommendations Here are some of recommendations, any one of that can be used to mitigate this risk. 1. User a mapping to check duplicates. For this approach you to declare a variable `uint256 raffleID`, that way each raffle will have unique id. Add a mapping from player address to raffle id to keep of users for particular round. ```diff + uint256 public raffleID; + mapping (address => uint256) public usersToRaffleId; . . function enterRaffle(address[] memory newPlayers) public payable { require(msg.value == entranceFee * newPlayers.length, "PuppyRaffle: Must send enough to enter raffle"); for (uint256 i = 0; i < newPlayers.length; i++) { players.push(newPlayers[i]); + usersToRaffleId[newPlayers[i]] = true; } // Check for duplicates + for (uint256 i = 0; i < newPlayers.length; i++){ + require(usersToRaffleId[i] != raffleID, "PuppyRaffle: Already a participant"); - for (uint256 i = 0; i < players.length - 1; i++) { - for (uint256 j = i + 1; j < players.length; j++) { - require(players[i] != players[j], "PuppyRaffle: Duplicate player"); - } } emit RaffleEnter(newPlayers); } . . . function selectWinner() external { //Existing code + raffleID = raffleID + 1; } ``` 2. Allow duplicates participants, As technically you can't stop people participants more than once. As players can use new address to enter. ```solidity function enterRaffle(address[] memory newPlayers) public payable { require(msg.value == entranceFee * newPlayers.length, "PuppyRaffle: Must send enough to enter raffle"); for (uint256 i = 0; i < newPlayers.length; i++) { players.push(newPlayers[i]); } emit RaffleEnter(newPlayers); } ```

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