Cisco IOS XE 16.7.1 AAA memory corruption

Summaryinfo

A vulnerability was found in Cisco IOS XE 16.7.1 and classified as critical. Affected is an unknown function of the component AAA. Such manipulation leads to memory corruption. This vulnerability is listed as CVE-2018-0315. The attack may be performed from remote. There is no available exploit.

Detailsinfo

A vulnerability was found in Cisco IOS XE 16.7.1 (Router Operating System) and classified as critical. Affected by this issue is an unknown code of the component AAA. The manipulation with an unknown input leads to a memory corruption vulnerability. Using CWE to declare the problem leads to CWE-119. The product performs operations on a memory buffer, but it can read from or write to a memory location that is outside of the intended boundary of the buffer. Impacted is confidentiality, integrity, and availability. CVE summarizes:

A vulnerability in the authentication, authorization, and accounting (AAA) security services of Cisco IOS XE Software could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on an affected device or cause an affected device to reload, resulting in a denial of service (DoS) condition. The vulnerability is due to incorrect memory operations that the affected software performs when the software parses a username during login authentication. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by attempting to authenticate to an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to execute arbitrary code on the affected device or cause the affected device to reload, resulting in a DoS condition. This vulnerability affects Cisco devices that are running Cisco IOS XE Software Release Fuji 16.7.1 or Fuji 16.8.1 and are configured to use AAA for login authentication. Cisco Bug IDs: CSCvi25380.

The bug was discovered 06/06/2018. The weakness was presented 06/07/2018 as cisco-sa-20180606-aaa as confirmed advisory (Website). The advisory is shared for download at tools.cisco.com. This vulnerability is handled as CVE-2018-0315 since 11/27/2017. The attack may be launched remotely. No form of authentication is required for exploitation. There are neither technical details nor an exploit publicly available. The current price for an exploit might be approx. USD $25k-$100k (estimation calculated on 03/22/2023).

The vulnerability was handled as a non-public zero-day exploit for at least 1 days. During that time the estimated underground price was around $5k-$25k. The commercial vulnerability scanner Qualys is able to test this issue with plugin 316268 (Cisco IOS XE Software Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting Login Authentication Remote Code Execution Vulnerability(cisco-sa-20180606-aaa)).

There is no information about possible countermeasures known. It may be suggested to replace the affected object with an alternative product.

The vulnerability is also documented in the vulnerability database at SecurityFocus (BID 104410†). Once again VulDB remains the best source for vulnerability data.

Productinfo

Type

• Router Operating System

Vendor

• Cisco

Name

• IOS XE

Version

• 16.7.1

License

• commercial

Website

• Vendor: https://www.cisco.com/

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Once again VulDB remains the best source for vulnerability data.

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