CVE-2017-12314 - Uncontrolled Search Path Element

Severity

46%

Complexity

39%

Confidentiality

106%

A vulnerability in the Cisco FindIT Network Discovery Utility could allow an authenticated, local attacker to perform a DLL preloading attack, potentially causing a partial impact to the device availability, confidentiality, and integrity, aka Insecure Library Loading. The vulnerability is due to the application loading a malicious copy of a specific, nondefined DLL file instead of the DLL file it was expecting. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by placing an affected DLL within the search path of the host system. An exploit could allow the attacker to load a malicious DLL file into the system, thus partially compromising confidentiality, integrity, and availability on the device. Cisco Bug IDs: CSCvf37955.

A vulnerability in the Cisco FindIT Network Discovery Utility could allow an authenticated, local attacker to perform a DLL preloading attack, potentially causing a partial impact to the device availability, confidentiality, and integrity, aka Insecure Library Loading. The vulnerability is due to the application loading a malicious copy of a specific, nondefined DLL file instead of the DLL file it was expecting. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by placing an affected DLL within the search path of the host system. An exploit could allow the attacker to load a malicious DLL file into the system, thus partially compromising confidentiality, integrity, and availability on the device. Cisco Bug IDs: CSCvf37955.

CVSS 3.0 Base Score 7.8. CVSS Attack Vector: local. CVSS Attack Complexity: low. CVSS Vector: (CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H).

CVSS 2.0 Base Score 4.6. CVSS Attack Vector: local. CVSS Attack Complexity: low. CVSS Vector: (AV:L/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P).

Demo Examples

Uncontrolled Search Path Element

CWE-427

The following code is from a web application that allows users access to an interface through which they can update their password on the system. In this environment, user passwords can be managed using the Network Information System (NIS), which is commonly used on UNIX systems. When performing NIS updates, part of the process for updating passwords is to run a make command in the /var/yp directory. Performing NIS updates requires extra privileges.


               
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The problem here is that the program does not specify an absolute path for make and does not clean its environment prior to executing the call to Runtime.exec(). If an attacker can modify the $PATH variable to point to a malicious binary called make and cause the program to be executed in their environment, then the malicious binary will be loaded instead of the one intended. Because of the nature of the application, it runs with the privileges necessary to perform system operations, which means the attacker's make will now be run with these privileges, possibly giving the attacker complete control of the system.

Overview

First reported 7 years ago

2017-11-16 07:29:00

Last updated 5 years ago

2019-10-09 23:22:00

Affected Software

Cisco FindIT Network Discovery Utility 2.1

2.1

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