CVE intelligence and bounded remediation

CVE-2025-20220 — A vulnerability in the CLI of Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center (FMC) Software and Cisco Secure Firewall Threat Defense (FTD)...

Medium CVSS 6

A vulnerability in the CLI of Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center (FMC) Software and Cisco Secure Firewall Threat Defense (FTD) Software could allow an authenticated, local attacker to execute arbitrary commands on the underlying operating system as root. This vulnerability is due to improper input validation for specific CLI commands. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by injecting operating system commands into a legitimate command. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to escape the restricted command prompt and execute arbitrary commands on the underlying operating system. To successfully exploit this vulnerability, an attacker would need valid Administrator credentials. For more information about vulnerable scenarios, see the Details ["#details"] section of this advisory.

Severity
Medium
CVSS
6 (3.1)
Published
2025-08-14
CISA KEV
Not currently listed
Ecosystem
software/application
Weaknesses
CWE-78

Affected products

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Matched remediation archetype

Command, code, expression, and template injection

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Check exposure

  • Trace untrusted values to process execution, interpreters, evaluators, template engines, dynamic imports, and administrative scripting features.
  • Determine whether the affected path is reachable across each trust boundary and which service account or host privilege it inherits.
  • Review configuration for optional execution features, unsafe compatibility modes, and shell invocation.

Remediate safely

  • Replace string-built commands or evaluated code with fixed operations and structured argument APIs that do not invoke a shell.
  • Use strict allowlists for operation identifiers and reject unexpected input before it reaches any interpreter.
  • Update the affected component and add inert regression tests covering metacharacters, encoding variants, and alternate request paths.

Authoritative sources

Complete CVE record and remediation plan

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