Vulnerabilities > CVE-2018-0501 - Improper Verification of Cryptographic Signature vulnerability in multiple products

047910
CVSS 5.9 - MEDIUM
Attack vector
NETWORK
Attack complexity
HIGH
Privileges required
NONE
Confidentiality impact
NONE
Integrity impact
HIGH
Availability impact
NONE
network
high complexity
canonical
debian
CWE-347
nessus
NVD
Published: 2018-08-21
Updated: 2024-11-21

Summary

The mirror:// method implementation in Advanced Package Tool (APT) 1.6.x before 1.6.4 and 1.7.x before 1.7.0~alpha3 mishandles gpg signature verification for the InRelease file of a fallback mirror, aka mirrorfail.

Vulnerable Configurations

Part Description Count
OS
Canonical
1
Application
Debian
6

Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE)

Common Attack Pattern Enumeration and Classification (CAPEC)

  • Padding Oracle Crypto Attack
    An attacker is able to efficiently decrypt data without knowing the decryption key if a target system leaks data on whether or not a padding error happened while decrypting the ciphertext. A target system that leaks this type of information becomes the padding oracle and an attacker is able to make use of that oracle to efficiently decrypt data without knowing the decryption key by issuing on average 128*b calls to the padding oracle (where b is the number of bytes in the ciphertext block). In addition to performing decryption, an attacker is also able to produce valid ciphertexts (i.e., perform encryption) by using the padding oracle, all without knowing the encryption key. Any cryptosystem can be vulnerable to padding oracle attacks if the encrypted messages are not authenticated to ensure their validity prior to decryption, and then the information about padding error is leaked to the attacker. This attack technique may be used, for instance, to break CAPTCHA systems or decrypt/modify state information stored in client side objects (e.g., hidden fields or cookies). This attack technique is a side-channel attack on the cryptosystem that uses a data leak from an improperly implemented decryption routine to completely subvert the cryptosystem. The one bit of information that tells the attacker whether a padding error during decryption has occurred, in whatever form it comes, is sufficient for the attacker to break the cryptosystem. That bit of information can come in a form of an explicit error message about a padding error, a returned blank page, or even the server taking longer to respond (a timing attack). This attack can be launched cross domain where an attacker is able to use cross-domain information leaks to get the bits of information from the padding oracle from a target system / service with which the victim is communicating. To do so an attacker sends a request containing ciphertext to the target system. Due to the browser's same origin policy, the attacker is not able to see the response directly, but can use cross-domain information leak techniques to still get the information needed (i.e., information on whether or not a padding error has occurred). For instance, this can be done using "img" tag plus the onerror()/onload() events. The attacker's JavaScript can make web browsers to load an image on the target site, and know if the image is loaded or not. This is 1-bit information needed for the padding oracle attack to work: if the image is loaded, then it is valid padding, otherwise it is not.

Nessus

NASL familyUbuntu Local Security Checks
NASL idUBUNTU_USN-3746-1.NASL
descriptionIt was discovered that APT incorrectly handled the mirror method (mirror://). If a remote attacker were able to perform a man-in-the-middle attack, this flaw could potentially be used to install altered packages in environments configured to use mirror:// entries. Note that Tenable Network Security has extracted the preceding description block directly from the Ubuntu security advisory. Tenable has attempted to automatically clean and format it as much as possible without introducing additional issues.
last seen2020-06-01
modified2020-06-02
plugin id112032
published2018-08-21
reporterUbuntu Security Notice (C) 2018-2019 Canonical, Inc. / NASL script (C) 2018-2019 and is owned by Tenable, Inc. or an Affiliate thereof.
sourcehttps://www.tenable.com/plugins/nessus/112032
titleUbuntu 18.04 LTS : apt vulnerability (USN-3746-1)
code
#
# (C) Tenable Network Security, Inc.
#
# The descriptive text and package checks in this plugin were
# extracted from Ubuntu Security Notice USN-3746-1. The text 
# itself is copyright (C) Canonical, Inc. See 
# <http://www.ubuntu.com/usn/>. Ubuntu(R) is a registered 
# trademark of Canonical, Inc.
#

include("compat.inc");

if (description)
{
  script_id(112032);
  script_version("1.4");
  script_cvs_date("Date: 2019/09/18 12:31:48");

  script_cve_id("CVE-2018-0501");
  script_xref(name:"USN", value:"3746-1");

  script_name(english:"Ubuntu 18.04 LTS : apt vulnerability (USN-3746-1)");
  script_summary(english:"Checks dpkg output for updated package.");

  script_set_attribute(
    attribute:"synopsis", 
    value:"The remote Ubuntu host is missing a security-related patch."
  );
  script_set_attribute(
    attribute:"description", 
    value:
"It was discovered that APT incorrectly handled the mirror method
(mirror://). If a remote attacker were able to perform a
man-in-the-middle attack, this flaw could potentially be used to
install altered packages in environments configured to use mirror://
entries.

Note that Tenable Network Security has extracted the preceding
description block directly from the Ubuntu security advisory. Tenable
has attempted to automatically clean and format it as much as possible
without introducing additional issues."
  );
  script_set_attribute(
    attribute:"see_also",
    value:"https://usn.ubuntu.com/3746-1/"
  );
  script_set_attribute(attribute:"solution", value:"Update the affected apt package.");
  script_set_cvss_base_vector("CVSS2#AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:N/I:P/A:N");
  script_set_cvss3_base_vector("CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N");

  script_set_attribute(attribute:"plugin_type", value:"local");
  script_set_attribute(attribute:"cpe", value:"p-cpe:/a:canonical:ubuntu_linux:apt");
  script_set_attribute(attribute:"cpe", value:"cpe:/o:canonical:ubuntu_linux:18.04:-:lts");

  script_set_attribute(attribute:"vuln_publication_date", value:"2018/08/21");
  script_set_attribute(attribute:"patch_publication_date", value:"2018/08/20");
  script_set_attribute(attribute:"plugin_publication_date", value:"2018/08/21");
  script_set_attribute(attribute:"generated_plugin", value:"current");
  script_end_attributes();

  script_category(ACT_GATHER_INFO);
  script_copyright(english:"Ubuntu Security Notice (C) 2018-2019 Canonical, Inc. / NASL script (C) 2018-2019 and is owned by Tenable, Inc. or an Affiliate thereof.");
  script_family(english:"Ubuntu Local Security Checks");

  script_dependencies("ssh_get_info.nasl");
  script_require_keys("Host/cpu", "Host/Ubuntu", "Host/Ubuntu/release", "Host/Debian/dpkg-l");

  exit(0);
}


include("audit.inc");
include("ubuntu.inc");
include("misc_func.inc");

if ( ! get_kb_item("Host/local_checks_enabled") ) audit(AUDIT_LOCAL_CHECKS_NOT_ENABLED);
release = get_kb_item("Host/Ubuntu/release");
if ( isnull(release) ) audit(AUDIT_OS_NOT, "Ubuntu");
release = chomp(release);
if (! preg(pattern:"^(18\.04)$", string:release)) audit(AUDIT_OS_NOT, "Ubuntu 18.04", "Ubuntu " + release);
if ( ! get_kb_item("Host/Debian/dpkg-l") ) audit(AUDIT_PACKAGE_LIST_MISSING);

cpu = get_kb_item("Host/cpu");
if (isnull(cpu)) audit(AUDIT_UNKNOWN_ARCH);
if ("x86_64" >!< cpu && cpu !~ "^i[3-6]86$") audit(AUDIT_LOCAL_CHECKS_NOT_IMPLEMENTED, "Ubuntu", cpu);

flag = 0;

if (ubuntu_check(osver:"18.04", pkgname:"apt", pkgver:"1.6.3ubuntu0.1")) flag++;

if (flag)
{
  security_report_v4(
    port       : 0,
    severity   : SECURITY_WARNING,
    extra      : ubuntu_report_get()
  );
  exit(0);
}
else
{
  tested = ubuntu_pkg_tests_get();
  if (tested) audit(AUDIT_PACKAGE_NOT_AFFECTED, tested);
  else audit(AUDIT_PACKAGE_NOT_INSTALLED, "apt");
}

References