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Kora Token Payment Verification Error Causes Paymaster Losses

GHSA-725g-w329-g7qr
Summary

A programming error in Kora's token payment verification process can cause paymasters to receive less money than expected. This can happen when using the Token-2022 token with a specific configuration. To avoid financial losses, paymasters should review their payment processes and ensure they account for the transfer fees deducted by the SPL Token-2022 program.

What to do
  • Update kora-lib to version 2.0.5.
Affected software
VendorProductAffected versionsFix available
kora-lib <= 2.0.5 2.0.5
Original title
kora-lib: Token-2022 Transfer Fee Not Deducted During Payment Verification
Original description
## Summary

When a user pays transaction fees using a Token-2022 token with a `TransferFeeConfig` extension, Kora's `verify_token_payment()` credits the full raw transfer `amount` as the payment value. However, the on-chain SPL Token-2022 program withholds a portion of that amount as a transfer fee, so the paymaster's destination account only receives `amount - transfer_fee`. This means the paymaster consistently credits more value than it actually receives, resulting in systematic financial loss.

## Severity

**High**

## Affected Component

- **File:** `crates/lib/src/token/token.rs`
- **Function:** `verify_token_payment()`
- **Lines:** 529–654 (specifically 633–639)

## Root Cause

In `verify_token_payment()`, the `amount` extracted from the parsed SPL transfer instruction is the **pre-fee** amount (what the sender specifies in the `transfer_checked` instruction). The function passes this raw amount to `calculate_token_value_in_lamports()` to determine how many lamports the payment is worth. It never subtracts the Token-2022 transfer fee.

The fee estimation path (`fee.rs:analyze_payment_instructions`) correctly accounts for transfer fees by calculating them and adding them to the total fee. But the verification path does not perform the inverse subtraction, creating an asymmetry.

## Vulnerable Code

```rust
// crates/lib/src/token/token.rs:529-654
pub async fn verify_token_payment(
transaction_resolved: &mut VersionedTransactionResolved,
rpc_client: &RpcClient,
required_lamports: u64,
expected_destination_owner: &Pubkey,
) -> Result<bool, KoraError> {
let config = get_config()?;
let mut total_lamport_value = 0u64;

// ...

for instruction in transaction_resolved
.get_or_parse_spl_instructions()?
.get(&ParsedSPLInstructionType::SplTokenTransfer)
.unwrap_or(&vec![])
{
if let ParsedSPLInstructionData::SplTokenTransfer {
source_address,
destination_address,
mint,
amount, // <-- This is the PRE-FEE amount from the instruction
is_2022,
..
} = instruction
{
// ... destination validation ...

// LINE 633-639: Uses raw *amount without deducting transfer fee
let lamport_value = TokenUtil::calculate_token_value_in_lamports(
*amount, // <-- BUG: Should be (amount - transfer_fee)
&token_mint,
config.validation.price_source.clone(),
rpc_client,
)
.await?;

total_lamport_value = total_lamport_value
.checked_add(lamport_value)
.ok_or_else(|| {
KoraError::ValidationError("Payment accumulation overflow".to_string())
})?;
}
}

Ok(total_lamport_value >= required_lamports)
}
```

For comparison, the transfer fee calculation exists elsewhere in the codebase and is used during fee estimation:

```rust
// crates/lib/src/token/spl_token_2022.rs:165-198
pub fn calculate_transfer_fee(
&self,
amount: u64,
current_epoch: u64,
) -> Result<Option<u64>, KoraError> {
if let Some(fee_config) = self.get_transfer_fee() {
let transfer_fee = if current_epoch >= u64::from(fee_config.newer_transfer_fee.epoch) {
&fee_config.newer_transfer_fee
} else {
&fee_config.older_transfer_fee
};
let basis_points = u16::from(transfer_fee.transfer_fee_basis_points);
let maximum_fee = u64::from(transfer_fee.maximum_fee);
let fee_amount = (amount as u128)
.checked_mul(basis_points as u128)
.and_then(|product| product.checked_div(10_000))
// ...
Ok(Some(std::cmp::min(fee_amount, maximum_fee)))
} else {
Ok(None)
}
}
```

This function exists but is **never called** in `verify_token_payment()`.

## Proof of Concept

### Arithmetic Demonstration

Given:
- Token-2022 token with 5% transfer fee (500 basis points), whitelisted in `allowed_spl_paid_tokens`
- Transaction fee cost: 5000 lamports equivalent
- Token price: 1 token = 5 lamports

**What should happen:**
- User needs to pay 5000 lamports worth → 1000 tokens
- Transfer fee on 1000 tokens at 5% = 50 tokens
- Paymaster destination receives: 1000 - 50 = 950 tokens (worth 4750 lamports)
- User should be required to pay MORE to cover the fee

**What actually happens:**
- User sends `transfer_checked` for `amount = 1000` tokens
- `verify_token_payment()` calculates: 1000 tokens * 5 lamports/token = 5000 lamports
- 5000 >= 5000 required → **payment verified as sufficient**
- But paymaster only received 950 tokens (worth 4750 lamports)
- **Paymaster lost 250 lamports on this transaction**

**Over 1000 transactions:** Paymaster loses 250,000 lamports (0.25 SOL)

### Runnable Test (using existing test infrastructure)

```rust
#[tokio::test]
async fn test_token2022_transfer_fee_not_deducted_in_verification() {
// Setup: Token-2022 mint with 10% transfer fee (1000 bps)
let transfer_fee_config = create_transfer_fee_config(
1000, // 10% basis points
u64::MAX, // no maximum fee cap
);

let mint_pubkey = Pubkey::new_unique();
let mint_account = MintAccountMockBuilder::new()
.with_decimals(6)
.with_supply(1_000_000_000_000)
.with_extension(ExtensionType::TransferFeeConfig)
.build_token2022();

// User sends transfer_checked for 1,000,000 tokens (1 token at 6 decimals)
let transfer_amount: u64 = 1_000_000;

// What verify_token_payment credits:
let credited_amount = transfer_amount; // = 1,000,000

// What the paymaster actually receives (after 10% on-chain fee):
let actual_received = transfer_amount - (transfer_amount * 1000 / 10000); // = 900,000

// BUG: credited_amount (1,000,000) > actual_received (900,000)
// Paymaster is credited 11.1% MORE than it actually receives
assert!(credited_amount > actual_received);
assert_eq!(credited_amount - actual_received, 100_000); // 100,000 token units lost

// The financial loss per transaction = 10% of the payment amount
// This is NOT a rounding error — it is a full percentage-based loss
}
```

## Impact

- **Systematic Financial Loss:** The paymaster consistently credits more token value than it receives for every transaction paid with a transfer-fee-bearing Token-2022 token.
- **Loss Scale:** Proportional to `transfer_fee_basis_points / 10000 * payment_amount` per transaction. For a token with 5% fee and 100 transactions/day at $1 each, that is $5/day or $1,825/year in losses.
- **Precondition:** Requires a Token-2022 token with `TransferFeeConfig` extension to be whitelisted in `allowed_spl_paid_tokens`. The existing test infrastructure already creates such tokens (`TestAccountSetup::create_usdc_mint_2022()` with 100 bps / 1% fee).

## Recommendation

Deduct the Token-2022 transfer fee before calculating the lamport value of the payment:

```rust
// In verify_token_payment(), after extracting amount:
let effective_amount = if *is_2022 {
// Fetch the mint to check for TransferFeeConfig
let mint_account = CacheUtil::get_account(
rpc_client,
&token_mint,
false,
).await?;
let mint_info = Token2022MintInfo::from_account_data(&mint_account.data)?;

if let Ok(Some(fee)) = mint_info.calculate_transfer_fee(
*amount,
rpc_client.get_epoch_info().await?.epoch,
) {
amount.saturating_sub(fee)
} else {
*amount
}
} else {
*amount
};

let lamport_value = TokenUtil::calculate_token_value_in_lamports(
effective_amount, // Use post-fee amount
&token_mint,
config.validation.price_source.clone(),
rpc_client,
)
.await?;
```

## References

- `crates/lib/src/token/token.rs:529-654` — `verify_token_payment()` using raw amount
- `crates/lib/src/token/spl_token_2022.rs:165-198` — `calculate_transfer_fee()` (exists but not called in verification)
- `crates/lib/src/fee/fee.rs:174-204` — `analyze_payment_instructions()` (correctly accounts for transfer fee in estimation)
- SPL Token-2022 specification: transfer fees are deducted from the transfer amount by the on-chain program
Published: 12 Mar 2026 · Updated: 13 Mar 2026 · First seen: 12 Mar 2026