CVE-2019-17642 in Centreon
Summary
by MITRE
An issue was discovered in Centreon before 18.10.8, 19.10.1, and 19.04.2. It allows CSRF with resultant remote command execution via shell metacharacters in a POST to centreon-autodiscovery-server/views/scan/ajax/call.php in the Autodiscovery plugin.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 03/06/2020
The vulnerability identified as CVE-2019-17642 represents a critical security flaw in the Centreon monitoring platform that affects multiple versions including those before 18.10.8, 19.10.1, and 19.04.2. This issue stems from a dangerous combination of cross-site request forgery (CSRF) and command injection vulnerabilities that together create a severe attack vector for malicious actors seeking to compromise monitoring infrastructure. The vulnerability specifically resides within the Autodiscovery plugin's endpoint at centreon-autodiscovery-server/views/scan/ajax/call.php, making it accessible through a POST request that can be exploited to execute arbitrary commands on the target system.
The technical exploitation of this vulnerability involves a sophisticated attack chain that begins with a CSRF payload crafted to trick authenticated users into executing malicious requests against the Centreon system. The flaw occurs because the application fails to properly validate and sanitize user input received through the AJAX endpoint, allowing attackers to inject shell metacharacters that get processed as command-line arguments. This represents a classic command injection vulnerability where user-controllable data flows directly into shell execution contexts without proper sanitization or escaping mechanisms. The vulnerability manifests when the application processes the POST data through the autodiscovery scanning functionality, which then executes system commands using the unvalidated input, creating a direct path for remote code execution.
From an operational impact perspective, this vulnerability poses a significant threat to organizations relying on Centreon for infrastructure monitoring, as successful exploitation can result in complete system compromise. Attackers can leverage this vulnerability to gain unauthorized access to the monitoring server, potentially escalating privileges to execute arbitrary commands with the same privileges as the Centreon application. The implications extend beyond simple unauthorized access, as compromised monitoring systems can provide attackers with insights into network topology, service availability, and operational status that could be used for further attacks. This vulnerability directly violates the principle of least privilege and can lead to data exfiltration, system modification, or complete infrastructure takeover, particularly in environments where Centreon serves as a central monitoring point for critical infrastructure components.
The vulnerability aligns with CWE-77 and CWE-352, representing command injection and cross-site request forgery respectively, and maps to ATT&CK technique T1059.007 for command and script injection, as well as T1566 for credential harvesting through social engineering or session manipulation. Organizations should implement immediate mitigations including applying the vendor-provided patches for versions 18.10.8, 19.10.1, and 19.04.2, enabling proper input validation and output encoding mechanisms, and implementing network segmentation to limit access to the affected endpoint. Additional security controls such as web application firewalls, session management improvements, and regular security assessments should be deployed to prevent exploitation attempts. The vulnerability underscores the critical importance of validating all user inputs and implementing robust access controls, particularly for administrative interfaces and automated system functions that process external data inputs.