CVE intelligence and bounded remediation

CVE-2018-18505 — Mozilla Firefox security vulnerability

Critical CVSS 10

An earlier fix for an Inter-process Communication (IPC) vulnerability, CVE-2011-3079, added authentication to communication between IPC endpoints and server parents during IPC process creation. This authentication is insufficient for channels created after the IPC process is started, leading to the authentication not being correctly applied to later channels. This could allow for a sandbox escape through IPC channels due to lack of message validation in the listener process. This vulnerability affects Thunderbird < 60.5, Firefox ESR < 60.5, and Firefox < 65.

Severity
Critical
CVSS
10 (3.0)
Published
2019-02-05
CISA KEV
Not currently listed
Ecosystem
browser
Weaknesses
CWE-287

Affected products

  • mozilla / firefox
  • mozilla / thunderbird
  • canonical / ubuntu_linux / 14.04
  • canonical / ubuntu_linux / 16.04
  • canonical / ubuntu_linux / 18.04
  • canonical / ubuntu_linux / 18.10

Showing 6 representative product identities from 18 source matches. Confirm exact affected versions with the linked vendor and NVD evidence.

Matched remediation archetype

Authentication bypass and missing authentication

This catalog composition supplies bounded fallback guidance. Explicitly reviewed curated workflows load with the complete record below.

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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