Quantum Secular Labs / Blog / Advisories
CVE-2018-11749: Puppet Enterprise: Cleartext Transmission of Sensitive Information
CVE-2018-11749 is rated critical with a CVSS v3.0 base score of 9.8 and affects Puppet Enterprise. Per its scoring, it can be exploited over the network, without authentication, without any user interaction. The scored impact on confidentiality, integrity and availability is the highest available.
Vulnerability description
When users are configured to use startTLS with RBAC LDAP, at login time, the user's credentials are sent via plaintext to the LDAP server. This affects Puppet Enterprise 2018.1.3, 2017.3.9, and 2016.4.14, and is fixed in Puppet Enterprise 2018.1.4, 2017.3.10, and 2016.4.15. It scored an 8.5 CVSS score.
Severity breakdown
CVSS v3.0 9.8: CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
- Attack vector: Network. Exploitable remotely over the network, with no need for local or physical access.
- Attack complexity: Low. No special conditions; the attack can be repeated reliably.
- Privileges required: None. No account or prior access is needed.
- User interaction: None. No action from any user is needed.
- Scope: Unchanged. Impact stays within the vulnerable component.
- Confidentiality impact: High. Total loss of confidentiality; sensitive data can be fully disclosed.
- Integrity impact: High. Total loss of integrity; data or system state can be fully modified.
- Availability impact: High. Total loss of availability; the component can be shut down.
Underlying weakness
CWE-319: Cleartext Transmission of Sensitive Information
The product transmits sensitive or security-critical data in cleartext in a communication channel that can be sniffed by unauthorized actors.
Affected products
- Puppet Enterprise: up to and including 2016.4.14; from 2017.3.0 up to and including 2017.3.9; from 2018.1.0 up to and including 2018.1.3