CVE-2016-6365 in FirePOWER Management Center
Summary
by MITRE
Cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in Cisco Firepower Management Center 4.10.3, 5.2.0, 5.3.0, 5.3.0.2, 5.3.1, and 5.4.0 allows remote attackers to inject arbitrary web script or HTML via unspecified parameters, aka Bug IDs CSCur25508 and CSCur25518.
Be aware that VulDB is the high quality source for vulnerability data.
Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 11/26/2024
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2016-6365 represents a critical cross-site scripting flaw within Cisco Firepower Management Center versions 4.10.3 through 5.4.0. This security weakness manifests as an input validation issue that permits malicious actors to inject arbitrary web scripts or HTML content into the affected system. The vulnerability affects the management interface of Cisco's network security platform, which serves as the central control point for Firepower devices and provides comprehensive security policy management capabilities. The flaw was specifically tracked under Bug IDs CSCur25508 and CSCur25518, indicating the severity and scope of the issue within Cisco's internal tracking systems.
The technical nature of this vulnerability stems from insufficient sanitization of user-supplied input parameters within the web interface of the Firepower Management Center. When legitimate users interact with the management console, the system fails to properly validate or escape data submitted through unspecified parameters, creating an avenue for attackers to execute malicious scripts within the context of authenticated sessions. This type of vulnerability falls under the CWE-79 category of Cross-Site Scripting, which is classified as a critical weakness in web applications that allows attackers to inject client-side scripts into web pages viewed by other users. The vulnerability's impact is amplified because it affects the management interface, which typically requires elevated privileges and contains sensitive configuration data.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple script injection, as it enables attackers to potentially hijack user sessions, steal administrative credentials, and access sensitive network security configurations. An attacker could leverage this vulnerability to execute arbitrary commands on behalf of authenticated users, potentially gaining full administrative control over the Firepower Management Center. This could result in unauthorized access to security policies, network monitoring data, and configuration settings that control the entire network security infrastructure. The vulnerability affects organizations that rely on Cisco's Firepower platform for network security management, potentially exposing critical infrastructure to compromise through a single vulnerable web interface component.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability should include immediate patching of affected Firepower Management Center versions to the latest available releases that contain the necessary security fixes. Organizations should also implement network segmentation and access controls to limit exposure of the management interface to trusted networks only. Security monitoring should be enhanced to detect suspicious web traffic patterns that might indicate exploitation attempts, and regular security assessments should be conducted to identify similar input validation weaknesses in other network management systems. The vulnerability aligns with ATT&CK technique T1059.007 for Command and Scripting Interpreter: JavaScript, as it enables attackers to execute malicious scripts within the browser context of authenticated users. Additionally, this issue demonstrates the importance of implementing proper input validation and output encoding practices as recommended in the OWASP Top Ten Project's prevention guidelines for XSS vulnerabilities. Organizations should also consider implementing web application firewalls and content security policies to provide additional protection layers against such attacks.