CVE-2019-14433 in OpenStack Nova
Summary
by MITRE
An issue was discovered in OpenStack Nova before 17.0.12, 18.x before 18.2.2, and 19.x before 19.0.2. If an API request from an authenticated user ends in a fault condition due to an external exception, details of the underlying environment may be leaked in the response, and could include sensitive configuration or other data.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 11/23/2023
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2019-14433 represents a critical information disclosure flaw within OpenStack Nova, the cloud computing orchestration component responsible for managing virtual machine lifecycles. This weakness affects multiple stable release branches of Nova, specifically before versions 17.0.12, 18.2.2, and 19.0.2, indicating a widespread impact across the OpenStack ecosystem. The vulnerability arises from inadequate error handling mechanisms that fail to sanitize error responses when external exceptions occur during authenticated API requests, creating a pathway for sensitive system information to be exposed to unauthorized parties.
The technical nature of this flaw stems from Nova's insufficient sanitization of error messages generated during API request processing. When an authenticated user makes an API call that results in a fault condition due to external exceptions such as database connectivity issues, network failures, or hardware problems, the system's error handling routine fails to properly filter or obscure sensitive details from the response payload. This misconfiguration allows attackers to potentially extract configuration parameters, system paths, database connection strings, and other environment-specific information that could aid in further exploitation attempts.
From an operational perspective, this vulnerability creates significant risk for cloud infrastructure deployments that rely on OpenStack Nova for virtual machine management. The leaked information could include database credentials, file system paths, network configurations, and other sensitive data that would normally be protected from unauthorized access. Security professionals should note that this vulnerability aligns with CWE-209, which describes "Information Exposure Through an Error Message" and represents a classic example of how poor error handling can lead to information disclosure attacks. The impact extends beyond simple data exposure as the leaked information could enable attackers to perform more sophisticated attacks such as privilege escalation, lateral movement within the cloud environment, or targeted exploitation of other system components.
The operational impact of this vulnerability is particularly concerning given that it affects authenticated users, meaning that even legitimate users with valid credentials could inadvertently expose sensitive information through normal API interactions. This creates a scenario where both insider threats and compromised accounts could potentially leverage this weakness to gain unauthorized access to system internals. The vulnerability also demonstrates characteristics consistent with ATT&CK technique T1082, Information Discovery, as it enables adversaries to gather system information that could be used for further compromise. Organizations running affected Nova versions should prioritize immediate patching to prevent potential exploitation, as the information disclosure could serve as a foundation for more serious security incidents including data breaches, service disruption, or complete system compromise. The vulnerability underscores the critical importance of proper error handling practices in cloud infrastructure components and highlights the need for comprehensive security testing that includes evaluation of error response sanitization mechanisms.