CVE-2007-1789 in Flyspray
Summary
by MITRE
Flyspray 0.9.9 allows remote attackers to obtain sensitive information (private project summaries) via direct requests.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 08/28/2018
The vulnerability described in CVE-2007-1789 represents a critical access control flaw in Flyspray version 0.9.9, a web-based issue tracking system widely used for project management and bug reporting. This vulnerability falls under the category of information disclosure, specifically affecting the confidentiality aspect of the application's security model. The flaw enables unauthenticated remote attackers to bypass the application's authorization mechanisms and directly access private project summaries that should normally be restricted to authorized users only.
The technical nature of this vulnerability stems from insufficient input validation and access control checks within the Flyspray application's request handling mechanism. When users make direct requests to specific endpoints or parameters within the application, the system fails to properly verify whether the requesting user has appropriate authorization levels to access the requested private project data. This weakness allows attackers to construct malicious URLs or API calls that directly target private project summaries without proper authentication, effectively undermining the application's role-based access control system.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple data exposure, as private project summaries often contain sensitive information about ongoing development work, security vulnerabilities, project timelines, resource allocations, and business-critical details that could be exploited by malicious actors. Attackers could potentially gather intelligence about software development processes, identify potential attack vectors, or even discover security weaknesses in the target organization's infrastructure. This information disclosure could lead to more sophisticated attacks, competitive intelligence gathering, or even targeted exploitation of the organization's development environment.
From a cybersecurity perspective, this vulnerability aligns with CWE-284, which describes improper access control, and represents a classic example of how weak authorization checks can lead to unauthorized information access. The flaw also connects to ATT&CK technique T1566, which covers credential harvesting through social engineering, as the vulnerability enables attackers to obtain sensitive information without requiring valid credentials. Organizations using Flyspray 0.9.9 should immediately implement mitigations including applying the vendor-provided security patches, implementing proper access controls, and conducting thorough security audits of their issue tracking systems. Additionally, network segmentation and monitoring solutions should be deployed to detect and prevent unauthorized access attempts to sensitive application endpoints. The vulnerability underscores the critical importance of implementing robust authentication and authorization mechanisms in web applications, particularly those handling sensitive project data and development information.