CVE-2018-0270

A vulnerability in the web-based management interface of Cisco IoT Field Network Director (IoT-FND) could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to conduct a cross-site request forgery (CSRF) attack and alter the data of existing users and groups on an affected device. The vulnerability is due to insufficient CSRF protections for the web-based management interface on an affected device. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by persuading a user of the interface to follow a malicious link. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to perform arbitrary actions with the privilege level of the affected user. If the user has administrative privileges, the attacker could create a new, privileged account to obtain full control over the device interface. This vulnerability affects Connected Grid Network Management System, if running a software release prior to IoT-FND Release 3.0; and IoT Field Network Director, if running a software release prior to IoT-FND Release 4.1.1-6 or 4.2.0-123. Cisco Bug IDs: CSCvi02448.

Weakness

The web application does not, or can not, sufficiently verify whether a well-formed, valid, consistent request was intentionally provided by the user who submitted the request.

Affected Software

Potential Mitigations

• Use a vetted library or framework that does not allow this weakness to occur or provides constructs that make this weakness easier to avoid.
• For example, use anti-CSRF packages such as the OWASP CSRFGuard. [REF-330]
• Another example is the ESAPI Session Management control, which includes a component for CSRF. [REF-45]
• Use the “double-submitted cookie” method as described by Felten and Zeller:
• When a user visits a site, the site should generate a pseudorandom value and set it as a cookie on the user’s machine. The site should require every form submission to include this value as a form value and also as a cookie value. When a POST request is sent to the site, the request should only be considered valid if the form value and the cookie value are the same.
• Because of the same-origin policy, an attacker cannot read or modify the value stored in the cookie. To successfully submit a form on behalf of the user, the attacker would have to correctly guess the pseudorandom value. If the pseudorandom value is cryptographically strong, this will be prohibitively difficult.
• This technique requires Javascript, so it may not work for browsers that have Javascript disabled. [REF-331]

Related Attack Patterns

• https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/111.html
• https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/462.html
• https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/467.html
• https://cwe.mitre.org/data/definitions/62.html

References

• http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/104242
• https://tools.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-20180516-fnd