CVE-2017-10181 in FLEXCUBE Direct Banking
Summary
by MITRE
Vulnerability in the Oracle FLEXCUBE Direct Banking component of Oracle Financial Services Applications (subcomponent: Forgot Password). Supported versions that are affected are 12.0.2 and 12.0.3. Easily exploitable vulnerability allows low privileged attacker with network access via HTTP to compromise Oracle FLEXCUBE Direct Banking. Successful attacks require human interaction from a person other than the attacker. Successful attacks of this vulnerability can result in unauthorized ability to cause a hang or frequently repeatable crash (complete DOS) of Oracle FLEXCUBE Direct Banking as well as unauthorized update, insert or delete access to some of Oracle FLEXCUBE Direct Banking accessible data and unauthorized read access to a subset of Oracle FLEXCUBE Direct Banking accessible data. CVSS 3.0 Base Score 6.8 (Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability impacts). CVSS Vector: (CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:L/I:L/A:H).
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 01/02/2021
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2017-10181 resides within Oracle FLEXCUBE Direct Banking component, specifically within the Forgot Password subcomponent of Oracle Financial Services Applications. This security flaw affects version 12.0.2 and 12.0.3 of the software, representing a critical concern for financial institutions utilizing this platform for their digital banking services. The vulnerability's classification as easily exploitable indicates that attackers can leverage relatively straightforward techniques to compromise the system, making it particularly dangerous in environments where financial data and transactions are processed.
The technical nature of this vulnerability stems from insufficient input validation and access control mechanisms within the Forgot Password functionality. Attackers with low privileged network access via HTTP protocols can exploit this weakness to gain unauthorized access to the system's resources. The vulnerability requires human interaction from users other than the attacker, suggesting that social engineering or phishing techniques may be necessary to initiate the attack vector. This characteristic places additional emphasis on user awareness training and security protocols within financial institutions. The CVSS 3.0 scoring system rates this vulnerability at 6.8, indicating a high severity level that combines confidentiality, integrity, and availability impacts.
The operational impact of successful exploitation manifests in multiple ways that can severely compromise financial services operations. Attackers can achieve complete denial of service conditions that cause system hangs or frequent crashes, effectively rendering the Direct Banking platform unavailable to legitimate users. Beyond the immediate availability disruption, the vulnerability enables unauthorized modification of system data through update, insert, or delete operations on accessible data sets. Additionally, attackers can gain unauthorized read access to sensitive information within the system, potentially exposing customer data, transaction records, or financial information. The combination of these impacts creates a comprehensive threat that can undermine both the operational integrity and security posture of financial institutions relying on this platform.
The vulnerability aligns with CWE-20 (Improper Input Validation) and CWE-284 (Improper Access Control) categories, reflecting fundamental security weaknesses in the application's design and implementation. From an ATT&CK framework perspective, this vulnerability maps to T1210 (Exploitation of Remote Services) and T1068 (Exploitation for Privilege Escalation) techniques, demonstrating how attackers can leverage network-based access to escalate privileges and compromise system resources. Organizations should implement immediate mitigations including applying Oracle's security patches, implementing network segmentation to limit access to the vulnerable component, and enhancing monitoring of authentication-related activities. Additionally, organizations should conduct comprehensive security assessments of their FLEXCUBE implementations and consider implementing additional authentication controls and user behavior analytics to detect potential exploitation attempts.