CVE-2022-35809 in Azure Site Recovery VMWare to Azure
Summary
by MITRE • 08/10/2022
Azure Site Recovery Elevation of Privilege Vulnerability. This CVE ID is unique from CVE-2022-35774, CVE-2022-35775, CVE-2022-35780, CVE-2022-35781, CVE-2022-35782, CVE-2022-35783, CVE-2022-35784, CVE-2022-35785, CVE-2022-35786, CVE-2022-35787, CVE-2022-35788, CVE-2022-35789, CVE-2022-35790, CVE-2022-35791, CVE-2022-35799, CVE-2022-35800, CVE-2022-35801, CVE-2022-35802, CVE-2022-35807, CVE-2022-35808, CVE-2022-35810, CVE-2022-35811, CVE-2022-35812, CVE-2022-35813, CVE-2022-35814, CVE-2022-35815, CVE-2022-35816, CVE-2022-35817, CVE-2022-35818, CVE-2022-35819.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 09/04/2022
The Azure Site Recovery service presents a critical elevation of privilege vulnerability that allows authenticated attackers to escalate their privileges within the Azure environment. This vulnerability specifically affects the replication and recovery processes managed by Azure Site Recovery, which is designed to protect virtual machines and physical servers by creating and managing recovery points. The flaw enables malicious actors who have already gained initial access to a user account to potentially elevate their privileges to administrative levels within the recovery service. This represents a significant security risk as it provides a pathway for attackers to move laterally within the Azure infrastructure and gain control over critical recovery operations that protect business continuity.
The technical root cause of this vulnerability stems from insufficient access controls and privilege validation mechanisms within the Azure Site Recovery service implementation. Attackers can exploit this weakness by manipulating specific API calls or service interactions that should require elevated permissions but instead permit unauthorized privilege escalation. The vulnerability manifests when the system fails to properly validate the privileges of authenticated users before granting access to recovery operations that should be restricted to administrators or service accounts. This flaw typically arises from improper implementation of role-based access control (RBAC) mechanisms, where the service does not adequately verify that the requesting entity possesses the necessary permissions to perform privileged operations. The vulnerability aligns with CWE-284, which describes improper access control in software systems, and represents a classic example of insufficient privilege checking in cloud services.
The operational impact of this vulnerability extends beyond simple privilege escalation, as it can enable attackers to compromise entire recovery environments and potentially disrupt business continuity operations. An attacker who successfully exploits this vulnerability could gain access to backup data, modify recovery configurations, or even delete critical recovery points that protect against data loss. This threat is particularly concerning for organizations that rely heavily on Azure Site Recovery for disaster recovery planning, as the attacker could potentially render the recovery infrastructure useless or manipulate it to serve malicious purposes. The vulnerability affects the core functionality of Azure Site Recovery's replication and failover capabilities, potentially allowing attackers to compromise the integrity of backup systems and undermine the organization's disaster recovery readiness. Organizations using Azure Site Recovery for critical workloads face significant risk of data exposure and operational disruption if this vulnerability is exploited.
Mitigation strategies for this vulnerability require immediate implementation of Azure security best practices and proactive monitoring of recovery service configurations. Organizations should ensure that all Azure Site Recovery services are updated to the latest versions that contain the patched implementation of access controls. Security teams must conduct comprehensive audits of their recovery service permissions and implement the principle of least privilege for all accounts accessing Site Recovery functionality. Regular monitoring of API access logs and privilege escalation attempts should be enabled through Azure Monitor and Azure Security Center to detect anomalous behavior. Additionally, organizations should implement network segmentation and restrict access to Site Recovery services to only trusted networks and IP addresses. The vulnerability demonstrates the importance of continuous security assessments and the need for robust identity and access management controls within cloud environments. Organizations should also consider implementing additional security layers such as conditional access policies and multi-factor authentication for accounts with Site Recovery access. This vulnerability highlights the critical need for proper security testing and validation of access control mechanisms in cloud services, particularly those that manage critical infrastructure recovery operations. The remediation process should include verification that all affected services have been properly patched and that access controls are functioning as intended.