CVE-2018-20307 in Virtual Traffic Manager
Summary
by MITRE
Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager 9.9 versions prior to 9.9r2 and 10.4r1 allow a remote authenticated user to obtain sensitive historical activity information by leveraging incorrect permission validation.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 04/22/2020
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2018-20307 affects Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager versions 9.9 prior to 9.9r2 and 10.4 prior to 10.4r1, representing a critical access control flaw that enables remote authenticated attackers to gain unauthorized access to sensitive historical activity information. This issue stems from inadequate permission validation mechanisms within the application's authorization framework, allowing malicious users with valid credentials to bypass intended security controls and access data they should not be permitted to view.
The technical root cause of this vulnerability lies in the improper implementation of access controls and permission validation logic within the Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager's administrative interface. When authenticated users attempt to access historical activity information, the system fails to properly verify whether the requesting user has adequate privileges to view such data. This misconfiguration creates a privilege escalation path where authenticated users can manipulate API calls or interface requests to retrieve sensitive historical activity logs, session data, and other confidential information that should be restricted to specific administrative roles.
From an operational impact perspective, this vulnerability poses significant risks to organizations relying on Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager for network traffic management and security monitoring. The exposure of historical activity information can provide attackers with valuable intelligence including user login patterns, connection timestamps, failed authentication attempts, and potentially sensitive session data that could be leveraged for further attacks. The compromised data may include information that could aid in social engineering attacks, credential harvesting, or understanding network behavior patterns for more sophisticated exploitation techniques.
The vulnerability aligns with CWE-285, which addresses improper authorization issues in software systems, and represents a clear violation of the principle of least privilege in cybersecurity. Attackers exploiting this flaw can potentially access sensitive data without detection, as the system's permission validation fails to properly enforce access restrictions. This weakness also maps to ATT&CK technique T1078 which covers valid accounts and privilege escalation, as the attacker leverages legitimate authenticated sessions to access restricted information.
Organizations should immediately apply the vendor-provided patches for Pulse Secure Virtual Traffic Manager versions 9.9r2 and 10.4r1 to remediate this vulnerability. Additionally, network administrators should implement comprehensive monitoring of access patterns and audit logs to detect potential exploitation attempts. Security teams should conduct thorough reviews of user permissions and access controls within the Pulse Secure environment to ensure that only authorized personnel can access sensitive historical activity information. Regular security assessments and penetration testing should be performed to identify similar permission validation flaws that may exist in other network management systems. The vulnerability demonstrates the critical importance of proper access control implementation and the potential consequences of insufficient permission validation in enterprise security infrastructure.