CVE-2024-26005 in CHARX SEC-3000
Summary
by MITRE • 03/12/2024
An unauthenticated remote attacker can gain service level privileges through an incomplete cleanup during service restart after a DoS.
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Analysis
by VulDB Data Team • 01/24/2025
This vulnerability represents a critical privilege escalation flaw that exploits the incomplete cleanup process during service restart operations following a denial of service condition. The vulnerability arises from inadequate resource management and state handling within the affected system's restart mechanism, allowing an unauthenticated remote attacker to potentially elevate their privileges to service level access. The flaw specifically manifests when the system attempts to recover from a denial of service scenario, creating a window of opportunity for malicious actors to exploit the incomplete cleanup procedures.
The technical implementation of this vulnerability involves a race condition or state inconsistency during service restart operations where temporary files, process handles, or system resources are not properly disposed of or reset. This incomplete cleanup creates persistent access vectors that attackers can leverage to gain elevated privileges. The vulnerability operates at the system level where the service restart process fails to properly validate or clean up all operational contexts, leaving behind artifacts that can be manipulated or accessed by unauthorized parties. According to CWE-691, this represents an inadequate cleanup vulnerability where insufficient resource management leads to persistent security weaknesses.
From an operational perspective, this vulnerability presents a significant risk as it requires no authentication to exploit, making it particularly dangerous for systems accessible over networks. The attack vector allows remote adversaries to trigger a denial of service condition and then immediately exploit the subsequent restart process to gain service level privileges. This creates a scenario where attackers can effectively bypass traditional authentication mechanisms and gain elevated system access without requiring valid credentials or prior access to the system. The impact extends beyond simple privilege escalation as it can potentially allow attackers to modify system configurations, access sensitive data, or establish persistent access points.
The exploitation process typically involves initiating a denial of service condition that triggers the service restart mechanism, followed by rapid exploitation of the incomplete cleanup state before the system can properly secure itself. This vulnerability aligns with ATT&CK technique T1068 which covers "Local Privilege Escalation" through the exploitation of system-level processes and resource management flaws. Security professionals should consider implementing immediate mitigations including patching affected systems, implementing proper resource cleanup procedures, and monitoring for unusual service restart patterns that could indicate exploitation attempts. Additionally, network segmentation and access controls should be reviewed to limit potential lateral movement once privileges are escalated. The vulnerability highlights the importance of proper state management during system recovery operations and underscores the need for comprehensive testing of restart and recovery scenarios to identify similar cleanup deficiencies.