CVE-2023-20040

moderate-risk
Published 2023-01-20

A vulnerability in the NETCONF service of Cisco Network Services Orchestrator (NSO) could allow an authenticated, remote attacker to cause a denial of service (DoS) on an affected system that is running as the root user. To exploit this vulnerability, the attacker must be a member of the admin group. This vulnerability exists because user-supplied input is not properly validated when NETCONF is used to upload packages to an affected device. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by uploading a specially crafted package file. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to write crafted files to arbitrary locations on the filesystem or delete arbitrary files from the filesystem of an affected device, resulting in a DoS condition. Note: By default, during install, Cisco NSO will be set up to run as the root user unless the --run-as-user option is used.

Do I need to act?

~
1.5% chance of exploitation in next 30 days
EPSS score — moderate exploit probability
-
Not on CISA KEV list
No confirmed active exploitation reported to CISA
?
Patch status unknown
Check vendor advisories for fix availability and mitigation guidance
5
CVSS 5.5/10 Medium
NETWORK / LOW complexity

Affected Vendors

32
/ 100
moderate-risk
Severity 21/34 · High
Exploitability 4/34 · Minimal
Exposure 7/34 · Low