CVE-2016-10808 in cPanel
Summary
by MITRE
In cPanel before 57.9999.54, /scripts/addpop and /scripts/delpop exposed TTYs (SEC-113).
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 07/22/2020
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2016-10808 affects cPanel versions prior to 57.9999.54 and involves the exposure of TTYs through the /scripts/addpop and /scripts/delpop executables. This issue represents a significant security flaw that could allow unauthorized access to system resources and potentially enable privilege escalation attacks. The exposure of TTY devices in these administrative scripts creates an attack surface that adversaries can exploit to gain elevated system privileges or access sensitive information.
The technical flaw stems from improper handling of terminal I/O operations within the addpop and delpop scripts that manage email account creation and deletion functions. These scripts are designed to interact with system terminals for user authentication and account management processes, but they fail to properly secure or isolate the TTY connections they establish. The vulnerability allows attackers to potentially intercept or manipulate terminal sessions, leading to unauthorized access to the system's email management capabilities and underlying system resources.
From an operational perspective, this vulnerability poses a serious risk to cPanel installations as it could enable attackers to perform unauthorized email account management operations. The exposure of TTY connections means that malicious actors could potentially inject commands into active terminal sessions or gain access to authentication tokens and credentials used during email account provisioning. This flaw directly impacts the security posture of web hosting environments where cPanel serves as the primary control interface for hosting providers and their customers.
The impact of this vulnerability aligns with CWE-284 (Improper Access Control) and CWE-776 (Improper Restriction of Recursive Entity References) categories, as it involves inadequate access controls on system terminal devices and potential recursive reference issues in script execution. The ATT&CK framework categorizes this vulnerability under T1068 (Local Privilege Escalation) and T1566 (Phishing) as attackers could exploit it to escalate privileges or gain unauthorized access to user accounts. Organizations using vulnerable cPanel versions face potential data breaches, unauthorized account manipulation, and system compromise through this exposure of TTY interfaces.
Mitigation strategies should include immediate upgrade to cPanel version 57.9999.54 or later, which contains the necessary patches to address the TTY exposure issue. System administrators should also implement network segmentation and access controls to limit exposure of administrative scripts, monitor for suspicious terminal activity, and conduct regular security audits of script execution environments. Additional defensive measures include implementing proper input validation for terminal I/O operations, restricting script execution permissions, and monitoring for unauthorized access attempts to email management functions. The vulnerability demonstrates the critical importance of secure terminal handling in administrative interfaces and highlights the need for comprehensive security testing of system scripts that interact with low-level system resources.