Cisco Mobility Services Engine Privilege Escalation Vulnerability

Summary

• A vulnerability in the installation procedure of the Cisco Mobility Services Engine (MSE) appliance could allow an authenticated, local attacker to escalate to the root level.
  
  The vulnerability is due to incorrect installation and permissions settings on binary files during the MSE physical or virtual appliance install procedure. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by logging into the device and escalating their privileges. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to acquire root-level privileges and take full control of the device.
  
  Cisco has released software updates that address this vulnerability. There are no workarounds that mitigate this vulnerability.
  
  This advisory is available at the following link: http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-20151104-privmse

Affected Products

• Vulnerable Products

  Cisco Mobility Services Engine (MSE) versions 8.0.120.7 and earlier are vulnerable. Administrators can use a command to determine whether a vulnerable version of Cisco MSE is running. Prior to 10.0, the command is getserverinfo. For 10.0 and later, the command is cmxctl version. The following examples show an MSE running versions 8.0.120.1 and 10.2.0:
  
  

  [mse]# getserverinfo 
  
  Health Monitor is running
  
  Retrieving MSE Services status.
  
  MSE services are up, getting the status
  
  
  
  -------------
  
  Server Config
  
  -------------
  
  
  
  Product name: Cisco Mobility Service Engine
  
  Version: 8.0.120.1
  
  Health Monitor Ip Address: 1.1.1.1
  
  High Availability Role: 1
  
  Hw Version: V01
  
  Hw Product Identifier: AIR-MSE-3365-K9
  
  Hw Serial Number: FCH1841V0YL
  
  
  
  [mse]# cmxctl version
  
  ----------------------------------------------------------------------
  
  Build Version   : 10.2.0
  
  Build Time       : 2015-10-19 11:20:06.632222
  
  ----------------------------------------------------------------------

  
  

  Products Confirmed Not Vulnerable

  No other Cisco products are currently known to be affected by this vulnerability.

Indicators of Compromise

• If authentication, accounting, and authorization (AAA) server logs indicate that an authenticated user is performing actions at a higher privilege level than their originally assigned role, it could indicate that the device has been compromised. In particular, the authenticated user can obtain root privilege; therefore, all commands executed at the root level should be monitored.

Workarounds

• There are no workarounds that mitigate this vulnerability.

Fixed Software

• When considering software upgrades, customers are advised to consult the Cisco Security Advisories and Responses archive at http://www.cisco.com/go/psirt and review subsequent advisories to determine exposure and a complete upgrade solution.
  
  In all cases, customers should ensure that the devices to upgrade contain sufficient memory and confirm that current hardware and software configurations will continue to be supported properly by the new release. If the information is not clear, customers are advised to contact the Cisco Technical Assistance Center (TAC) or their contracted maintenance providers.
  

  
  The following advisories are part of the November 2015 Cisco MSE Security Advisory Companion Publications:
  

  • cisco-sa-20151104-mse-cred
  • cisco-sa-20151104-privmse

  Software Download
  

  
  The Cisco MSE Static Credential Vulnerability is fixed in all versions after 8.0.120.7. The latest Cisco MSE software can be downloaded from the Software Center on Cisco.com by visiting http://www.cisco.com/cisco/software/navigator.html and selecting:
  
  Products > Wireless > Mobility Services > Mobility Services Engine
  
  

Exploitation and Public Announcements

• The Cisco Product Security Incident Response Team (PSIRT) is not aware of any public announcements or malicious use of the vulnerability that is described in this advisory.
  

Source

• Cisco would like to thank security researcher Jeremy Brown and Beyond Security’s SecuriTeam Secure Disclosure (SSD) group for discovering and reporting this vulnerability.
  

URL

• http://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-20151104-privmse

Revision History

• Version	Description	Section	Status	Date
  1.0	Initial public release.	-	Final	2015-November-04

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