CVE-2012-5603 in CloudForms
Summary
by MITRE
proxies_controller.rb in Katello in Red Hat CloudForms before 1.1 does not properly check permissions, which allows remote authenticated users to read consumer certificates or change arbitrary users settings via unspecified vectors related to the "consumer UUID" of a system.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 12/21/2021
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2012-5603 resides within the proxies_controller.rb component of Katello, a key component of Red Hat CloudForms platform version 1.1 and earlier. This flaw represents a critical permission bypass issue that undermines the security controls designed to protect sensitive system resources and user configurations. The vulnerability specifically affects the authorization mechanisms that should prevent unauthorized access to consumer certificates and user settings based on system identity.
The technical flaw manifests through improper validation of consumer UUIDs within the proxy controller functionality. Consumer UUIDs serve as unique identifiers for systems within the Katello framework, and their proper handling is essential for maintaining access control boundaries. When the system fails to adequately verify permissions associated with these UUIDs, authenticated attackers can exploit this weakness to perform unauthorized operations. The vulnerability allows attackers to read consumer certificates which contain sensitive cryptographic material used for system authentication and to modify arbitrary user settings, effectively compromising the integrity and confidentiality of the affected system.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple privilege escalation to encompass potential data exposure and configuration manipulation. Consumer certificates, once accessed, could be used to impersonate systems within the CloudForms environment, potentially enabling attackers to gain access to additional resources or perform man-in-the-middle attacks against system communications. The ability to change arbitrary user settings introduces risks of configuration corruption, privilege escalation, and potential disruption of service availability. Attackers could manipulate user access controls, modify system parameters, or establish persistent access points within the environment.
This vulnerability aligns with CWE-285, which addresses improper authorization issues in software systems, and demonstrates characteristics consistent with ATT&CK technique T1078 for valid accounts and T1566 for credential access. The flaw represents a classic case of insufficient access control validation where the system fails to properly verify that authenticated users possess appropriate permissions for the operations they attempt to perform. Organizations using Red Hat CloudForms versions prior to 1.1 should immediately implement mitigations including upgrading to patched versions, implementing additional monitoring for unauthorized certificate access patterns, and reviewing access control configurations to limit the scope of operations that can be performed through proxy controllers. The vulnerability highlights the importance of comprehensive authorization checking mechanisms, particularly when dealing with system identifiers that serve as authentication tokens within complex enterprise environments.