Vulnerabilities > CVE-2019-1732 - Improper Locking vulnerability in Cisco Nx-Os
Attack vector
LOCAL Attack complexity
MEDIUM Privileges required
NONE Confidentiality impact
COMPLETE Integrity impact
COMPLETE Availability impact
COMPLETE Summary
A vulnerability in the Remote Package Manager (RPM) subsystem of Cisco NX-OS Software could allow an authenticated, local attacker with administrator credentials to leverage a time-of-check, time-of-use (TOCTOU) race condition to corrupt local variables, which could lead to arbitrary command injection. The vulnerability is due to the lack of a proper locking mechanism on critical variables that need to stay static until used. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by authenticating to an affected device and issuing a set of RPM-related CLI commands. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to perform arbitrary command injection. The attacker would need administrator credentials for the targeted device.
Vulnerable Configurations
Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE)
Common Attack Pattern Enumeration and Classification (CAPEC)
- Leveraging Race Conditions This attack targets a race condition occurring when multiple processes access and manipulate the same resource concurrently and the outcome of the execution depends on the particular order in which the access takes place. The attacker can leverage a race condition by "running the race", modifying the resource and modifying the normal execution flow. For instance a race condition can occur while accessing a file, the attacker can trick the system by replacing the original file with his version and cause the system to read the malicious file.
- Leveraging Race Conditions via Symbolic Links This attack leverages the use of symbolic links (Symlinks) in order to write to sensitive files. An attacker can create a Symlink link to a target file not otherwise accessible to her. When the privileged program tries to create a temporary file with the same name as the Symlink link, it will actually write to the target file pointed to by the attackers' Symlink link. If the attacker can insert malicious content in the temporary file she will be writing to the sensitive file by using the Symlink. The race occurs because the system checks if the temporary file exists, then creates the file. The attacker would typically create the Symlink during the interval between the check and the creation of the temporary file.
Nessus
| NASL family | CISCO |
| NASL id | CISCO-SA-20190515-NXOS-RPM-INJEC.NASL |
| description | According to its self-reported version, Cisco NX-OS Software is affected by following vulnerability - A vulnerability in the Remote Package Manager (RPM) subsystem of Cisco NX-OS Software could allow an authenticated, local attacker with administrator credentials to leverage a time-of-check, time-of-use (TOCTOU) race condition to corrupt local variables, which could lead to arbitrary command injection.The vulnerability is due to the lack of a proper locking mechanism on critical variables that need to stay static until used. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by authenticating to an affected device and issuing a set of RPM-related CLI commands. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to perform arbitrary command injection. The attacker would need administrator credentials for the targeted device. (CVE-2019-1732) Please see the included Cisco BIDs and Cisco Security Advisory for more information |
| last seen | 2020-05-15 |
| modified | 2020-05-12 |
| plugin id | 136483 |
| published | 2020-05-12 |
| reporter | This script is Copyright (C) 2020 and is owned by Tenable, Inc. or an Affiliate thereof. |
| source | https://www.tenable.com/plugins/nessus/136483 |
| title | Cisco NX-OS Software Remote Package Manager Command Injection Vulnerability (cisco-sa-20190515-nxos-rpm-injec) |
| code | |