CVE-2003-0797 in IRIX
Summary
by MITRE
Unknown vulnerability in rpc.mountd in SGI IRIX 6.5 through 6.5.22 allows remote attackers to cause a denial of service (process death) via unknown attack vectors.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 04/11/2019
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2003-0797 represents a critical denial of service weakness within the rpc.mountd service of SGI IRIX operating systems ranging from version 6.5 through 6.5.22. This flaw resides in the Network File System (NFS) implementation that was widely used in enterprise environments during the early 2000s. The rpc.mountd daemon serves as a crucial component in the NFS architecture, responsible for managing mount requests from clients and maintaining the mapping between filesystem paths and their corresponding network locations. The vulnerability manifests when the service processes malformed or specially crafted network requests that trigger unexpected behavior in the daemon's processing logic, ultimately leading to process termination and complete service unavailability.
The technical nature of this vulnerability stems from insufficient input validation within the rpc.mountd service implementation. When the daemon receives network traffic containing malformed data structures or unexpected parameter values, it fails to properly sanitize or reject these inputs before processing them. This lack of proper boundary checking and input validation creates a condition where an attacker can craft specific network packets that cause the daemon to crash or enter an undefined state. The flaw operates at the protocol level within the RPC (Remote Procedure Call) framework that IRIX uses for distributed computing services, making it particularly dangerous as it can be exploited without requiring authentication or elevated privileges. This type of vulnerability is categorized under CWE-129 as "Improper Validation of Array Index" or more broadly as CWE-20 "Improper Input Validation" depending on the specific implementation details, which aligns with the common pattern of buffer overflows or invalid memory access conditions in legacy network services.
From an operational perspective, this vulnerability presents a significant risk to organizations relying on IRIX systems for critical data services. The denial of service impact means that legitimate users and applications depending on NFS services would experience complete disruption of file access capabilities across the network. This vulnerability is particularly concerning because it affects systems that were often deployed in mission-critical environments such as financial services, scientific computing facilities, and enterprise data centers where continuous availability is paramount. The attack vectors remain unspecified in the original CVE description, which suggests that the vulnerability may have been discovered through various methods including fuzzing or careful analysis of network protocols, and could potentially be triggered through multiple means including malformed mount requests or crafted RPC calls. The impact extends beyond simple service interruption as it can affect data integrity and availability, potentially causing cascading failures in larger network infrastructures that depend on the affected NFS services.
The mitigation strategies for CVE-2003-0797 should focus on immediate system hardening and long-term architectural considerations. Organizations should implement network segmentation to limit access to rpc.mountd services, restrict RPC port access to trusted networks, and deploy firewall rules that filter malformed network traffic. The most effective immediate solution involves applying vendor patches or upgrading to newer versions of IRIX that contain corrected implementations of the rpc.mountd service. System administrators should also consider implementing monitoring solutions that can detect unusual patterns in NFS service behavior and alert on potential exploitation attempts. According to ATT&CK framework, this vulnerability would map to T1499.004 "Endpoint Denial of Service" within the Defense Evasion and Impact categories, as it represents a method of disrupting service availability through process termination. Organizations should also implement regular vulnerability assessments and penetration testing to identify similar weaknesses in other legacy network services, particularly those that have not received security updates for extended periods. The vulnerability demonstrates the importance of maintaining up-to-date security patches and the risks associated with running legacy operating systems that may contain unpatched security flaws.