CVE-2016-7078 in Foreman
Summary
by MITRE
foreman before version 1.15.0 is vulnerable to an information leak through organizations and locations feature. When a user is assigned _no_ organizations/locations, they are able to view all resources instead of none (mirroring an administrator's view). The user's actions are still limited by their assigned permissions, e.g. to control viewing, editing and deletion.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 05/08/2023
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2016-7078 affects the foreman configuration management platform prior to version 1.15.0, representing a critical information disclosure weakness that undermines the platform's access control mechanisms. This flaw exists within the organizations and locations feature where the system fails to properly enforce resource isolation when users are explicitly assigned no organizational or location contexts. The vulnerability stems from a fundamental misconfiguration in the permission model where users without assigned organizations or locations are granted excessive visibility privileges that should be restricted to administrators or privileged users. This represents a classic privilege escalation issue that violates the principle of least privilege and can be categorized under CWE-284 Access Control Issues, specifically related to insufficient access control mechanisms.
The technical implementation of this vulnerability allows malicious or compromised users to gain unauthorized access to resources that should remain hidden or restricted based on their assigned organizational context. When users are configured with no organizational or location assignments, the system incorrectly grants them full visibility across all resources within the platform rather than restricting their access to zero resources as would be expected. This misbehavior creates a security boundary violation where the access control system fails to properly segment resources based on user context, effectively providing a backdoor mechanism for information leakage. The flaw operates at the application logic level where the permission checking routine does not adequately handle the edge case of users with empty organizational assignments, resulting in a default assumption that such users should have administrative visibility privileges.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple information disclosure to potentially enable more sophisticated attacks targeting sensitive configuration data, system resources, and administrative controls. An attacker exploiting this vulnerability could discover and potentially manipulate resources they should not have access to, including system configurations, user data, and potentially sensitive operational information. The vulnerability is particularly concerning because it affects the core access control functionality of the platform, meaning that even users with minimal privileges could gain extensive visibility into the entire system landscape. This creates a significant risk for organizations that rely on foreman for managing complex infrastructure configurations, as the vulnerability could expose sensitive operational data to unauthorized parties and potentially enable further exploitation through reconnaissance of system components and dependencies.
Mitigation strategies for CVE-2016-7078 should prioritize immediate patching to version 1.15.0 or later where the access control logic has been corrected to properly handle users with no assigned organizations or locations. Organizations should implement comprehensive access control reviews to ensure that users are properly assigned to appropriate organizational contexts and that no users exist in the unassigned state that could exploit this vulnerability. Network segmentation and monitoring should be enhanced to detect unusual access patterns that might indicate exploitation attempts, particularly around resource enumeration activities. The vulnerability demonstrates the importance of proper access control implementation and highlights the need for thorough testing of edge cases in permission systems, aligning with ATT&CK technique T1078 Valid Accounts and T1566 Phishing as these attacks often leverage compromised accounts to exploit such access control weaknesses. Organizations should also consider implementing additional logging and monitoring of access control decisions to detect and respond to similar privilege escalation scenarios.