CVE intelligence and bounded remediation

CVE-2018-0375 — Cisco Mobility Services Engine security vulnerability

Critical CVSS 9.8

A vulnerability in the Cluster Manager of Cisco Policy Suite before 18.2.0 could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to log in to an affected system using the root account, which has default, static user credentials. The vulnerability is due to the presence of undocumented, static user credentials for the root account. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by using the account to log in to an affected system. An exploit could allow the attacker to log in to the affected system and execute arbitrary commands as the root user. Cisco Bug IDs: CSCvh02680.

Severity
Critical
CVSS
9.8 (3.0)
Published
2018-07-18
CISA KEV
Not currently listed
Ecosystem
software/application
Weaknesses
CWE-798

Affected products

  • cisco / mobility_services_engine / 14.0.0
  • cisco / policy_suite

Matched remediation archetype

Authentication bypass and missing authentication

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Check exposure

  • Map every affected endpoint and protocol path, including alternate ports, legacy routes, recovery flows, service accounts, and machine-to-machine access.
  • Confirm which deployments enable the affected authentication mode and whether the interface is reachable from untrusted networks.
  • Review session, token, credential, and proxy trust configuration without attempting account takeover.

Remediate safely

  • Apply the supported fix and centralize fail-closed authentication before protected request handling.
  • Remove default or embedded credentials, rotate affected secrets and sessions, and bind authentication decisions to the intended audience and channel.
  • Add negative tests for alternate routes, malformed or absent credentials, recovery flows, and proxy-derived identity.

Authoritative sources

Complete CVE record and remediation plan

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