MEDHOST Connex contains a hard-coded Mirth Connect admin credential that is used for customer Mirth Connect management access. An attacker with knowledge of the hard-coded credential and the ability to communicate directly with the Mirth Connect management console may be able to intercept sensitive patient information. The admin account password is hard-coded as $K8t1ng throughout the application, and is the same across all installations. Customers do not have the option to change the Mirth Connect admin account password. The Mirth Connect admin account is created during the Connex install. The plaintext account password is hard-coded multiple times in the Connex install and update scripts.
The product contains hard-coded credentials, such as a password or cryptographic key, which it uses for its own inbound authentication, outbound communication to external components, or encryption of internal data.
| Name | Vendor | Start Version | End Version |
|---|---|---|---|
| Connex | Medhost | - (including) | - (including) |
Hard-coded credentials typically create a significant hole that allows an attacker to bypass the authentication that has been configured by the product administrator. This hole might be difficult for the system administrator to detect. Even if detected, it can be difficult to fix, so the administrator may be forced into disabling the product entirely. There are two main variations:
In the Inbound variant, a default administration account is created, and a simple password is hard-coded into the product and associated with that account. This hard-coded password is the same for each installation of the product, and it usually cannot be changed or disabled by system administrators without manually modifying the program, or otherwise patching the product. If the password is ever discovered or published (a common occurrence on the Internet), then anybody with knowledge of this password can access the product. Finally, since all installations of the product will have the same password, even across different organizations, this enables massive attacks such as worms to take place. The Outbound variant applies to front-end systems that authenticate with a back-end service. The back-end service may require a fixed password which can be easily discovered. The programmer may simply hard-code those back-end credentials into the front-end product. Any user of that program may be able to extract the password. Client-side systems with hard-coded passwords pose even more of a threat, since the extraction of a password from a binary is usually very simple.