CVE-2000-0466 in AIX
Summary
by MITRE
AIX cdmount allows local users to gain root privileges via shell metacharacters.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 04/11/2019
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2000-0466 represents a critical privilege escalation flaw in IBM AIX operating systems, specifically within the cdmount utility. This issue arises from insufficient input validation and sanitization mechanisms that fail to properly handle shell metacharacters in user-supplied arguments. The cdmount utility, designed to mount CD-ROM drives and other optical media, operates with elevated privileges to perform system-level operations, creating a dangerous attack surface when user input is not properly sanitized before being processed.
The technical exploitation of this vulnerability occurs when local users provide malicious input containing shell metacharacters such as semicolons, ampersands, or backticks to the cdmount command. These metacharacters are interpreted by the underlying shell during command execution, allowing attackers to inject arbitrary commands that execute with root privileges. The flaw stems from the utility's improper handling of command-line arguments, where user-supplied parameters are directly concatenated into shell commands without proper escaping or filtering mechanisms. This type of vulnerability aligns with CWE-78, which describes improper neutralization of special elements used in OS commands, and represents a classic example of command injection attacks that have been consistently documented across numerous security frameworks and threat models.
The operational impact of this vulnerability is severe as it provides local attackers with complete system compromise capabilities. Once exploited, attackers can execute arbitrary code with root privileges, potentially leading to full system takeover, data exfiltration, or establishment of persistent backdoors. The vulnerability affects systems where AIX cdmount is installed and accessible to local users, which typically includes most AIX installations in enterprise environments. Given that AIX systems often run critical business applications and contain sensitive data, the potential damage extends beyond simple privilege escalation to encompass complete organizational security breaches.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability require immediate patch application from IBM, as the flaw exists in the system's core mounting utilities and cannot be effectively addressed through configuration changes alone. Organizations should implement the latest security patches and updates provided by IBM to address this specific command injection vulnerability. Additionally, system administrators should conduct comprehensive security audits to identify and remove unnecessary installations of cdmount or similar utilities that may be vulnerable to similar issues. Network segmentation and privilege separation practices should be enforced to limit local user access to system-critical utilities. The remediation process should include monitoring for suspicious command execution patterns and implementing proper input validation across all system utilities that handle user-supplied data. This vulnerability demonstrates the critical importance of proper input sanitization and privilege separation in system design, as outlined in the ATT&CK framework's privilege escalation techniques that emphasize the exploitation of command injection vulnerabilities.