CVE-2018-1074 in ovirt-engine
Summary
by MITRE
ovirt-engine API and administration web portal before versions 4.2.2.5, 4.1.11.2 is vulnerable to an exposure of Power Management credentials, including cleartext passwords to Host Administrators. A Host Administrator could use this flaw to gain access to the power management systems of hosts they control.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 03/07/2023
The vulnerability described in CVE-2018-1074 represents a critical security flaw in the oVirt engine platform that affects versions prior to 4.2.2.5 and 4.1.11.2. This issue falls under the category of information exposure, specifically targeting power management credentials within the virtualization infrastructure. The oVirt engine serves as the central management platform for virtualized environments, providing both API and web portal interfaces for administrators to manage hosts, virtual machines, and underlying hardware components including power management systems.
The technical flaw manifests as an insecure handling of power management credentials within the oVirt engine's administrative interfaces. When administrators configure power management settings for hosts, the system stores authentication credentials in cleartext format within the database or configuration files. This cleartext storage represents a fundamental violation of security best practices and creates a significant attack surface. The vulnerability allows unauthorized access to power management systems, enabling malicious actors to gain control over host power states, potentially leading to service disruption, unauthorized system access, or even complete system compromise.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple credential exposure, as it provides attackers with the ability to manipulate power management systems directly. Host administrators who possess legitimate access to the oVirt engine can exploit this flaw to extract power management credentials, which then enable them to control host power states through external power management protocols such as IPMI, SSH, or other vendor-specific interfaces. This capability can be leveraged to perform denial of service attacks by powering off critical hosts, or to gain deeper access to the underlying infrastructure. The vulnerability directly aligns with attack patterns described in the MITRE ATT&CK framework under the credential access and privilege escalation domains, specifically targeting the persistence and defense evasion techniques that rely on maintaining access to critical infrastructure components.
From a compliance and standards perspective, this vulnerability violates multiple security requirements established by frameworks such as NIST SP 800-53, which mandates the protection of sensitive information including authentication credentials. The CWE (Common Weakness Enumeration) classification for this issue would fall under CWE-312, which describes "Cleartext Storage of Sensitive Information" and represents one of the most straightforward yet dangerous security flaws in information security. Organizations using oVirt engine platforms face significant risk of unauthorized access to their virtualized environments, particularly in scenarios where multiple administrators have access to the management interfaces. The vulnerability also creates opportunities for lateral movement within the infrastructure, as power management credentials often provide access to multiple systems within a data center or cloud environment, potentially enabling attackers to escalate privileges and maintain persistent access to critical infrastructure components. The remediation process requires immediate patching of affected versions, implementation of proper credential management practices, and consideration of privilege separation to limit the scope of potential damage from compromised administrator accounts.
The broader implications of this vulnerability highlight the importance of secure credential handling in enterprise virtualization platforms and demonstrate how seemingly minor configuration issues can create significant security risks. Organizations should implement comprehensive monitoring for credential exposure, establish regular security assessments of their virtualization management platforms, and ensure that all administrative interfaces properly encrypt sensitive information including passwords and authentication tokens. The vulnerability serves as a reminder of the critical need for secure development practices and proper security testing of enterprise management platforms that handle sensitive infrastructure credentials.