__________________________________________________________ The U.S. Department of Energy Computer Incident Advisory Capability ___ __ __ _ ___ / | /_\ / \___ __|__ / \ \___ __________________________________________________________ INFORMATION BULLETIN The Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance Vulnerability [US-CERT Vulnerability Note VU#563673] September 17, 2007 19:00 GMT Number R-352 ______________________________________________________________________________ PROBLEM: The Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) firewall may log user credientials, including passwords, as plain text when AAA authentication is enabled. PLATFORM: Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) DAMAGE: May log user credientials, including passwords, as plain text when AAA authentication is enabled. SOLUTION: Please see the workaround below. ______________________________________________________________________________ VULNERABILITY The risk is LOW. May log user credientials, including ASSESSMENT: passwords, as plain text when AAA authentication is enabled. ______________________________________________________________________________ LINKS: CIAC BULLETIN: http://www.ciac.org/ciac/bulletins/r-352.shtml ORIGINAL BULLETIN: http://www.kb.cert.org/vuls/id/563673 ______________________________________________________________________________ [***** Start US-CERT Vulnerability Note VU#563673 *****] Vulnerability Note VU#563673 The Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance insecurely logs passwords Overview The Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) firewall may log user credentials, including passwords, as plain text when AAA authentication is enabled. I. Description The Cisco Adapative Security Appliance (ASA) is a firewall with Intrusion Protection System (IPS), Stateful Packet Inspection (SPI), and routing features. The Cisco ASA includes Authentication, Authorization and Accounting (AAA) support that allows adminsitrators and users to use a single set of credentials to manage multiple devices. When setting up or troubleshooting the ASA server's AAA authentication features, the test button can be used to confirm that the AAA service is functioning properly. When the test button is clicked, the AAA username and password will be sent to the syslog service in plain text. If remote syslog is enabled, the credentials will be transmitted across the network in plain text, and stored on the syslog server in plain text. In the below screenshot, the vulnerable input box has been highlighted. II. Impact Authentication credentials may be stored in plain text, possibly on remote servers. The credentials may also be sent unencrypted over the network. III. Solution See the "Sytems Affected" section of this document for more information about obtaining updates. The following workarounds may partially mitigate this vulnerability: Check log files for stored AAA credentials, and change passwords if needed. Use management VLANs to seperate syslog network traffic from other devices on the network. Use access controls, file permissions, and physical security to ensure that syslog files can not be read by unauthorized individuals. Systems Affected Vendor Status Date Updated Cisco Systems, Inc. Vulnerable 5-Sep-2007 References http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/ps6120/index.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vlan http://secunia.com/advisories/26677/ Credit This vulnerability was reported and discovered by Lisa Sittler of CERT/CC. This document was written by Ryan Giobbi. Other Information Date Public 09/05/2007 Date First Published 09/05/2007 11:44:01 AM Date Last Updated 09/07/2007 CERT Advisory CVE Name Metric 0.13 Document Revision 19 [***** End US-CERT Vulnerability Note VU#563673 *****] _______________________________________________________________________________ CIAC wishes to acknowledge the contributions of US-CERT for the information contained in this bulletin. _______________________________________________________________________________ CIAC, the Computer Incident Advisory Capability, is the computer security incident response team for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the emergency backup response team for the National Institutes of Health (NIH). CIAC is located at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California. CIAC is also a founding member of FIRST, the Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams, a global organization established to foster cooperation and coordination among computer security teams worldwide. CIAC services are available to DOE, DOE contractors, and the NIH. CIAC can be contacted at: Voice: +1 925-422-8193 (7x24) FAX: +1 925-423-8002 STU-III: +1 925-423-2604 E-mail: ciac@ciac.org Previous CIAC notices, anti-virus software, and other information are available from the CIAC Computer Security Archive. World Wide Web: http://www.ciac.org/ Anonymous FTP: ftp.ciac.org PLEASE NOTE: Many users outside of the DOE, ESnet, and NIH computing communities receive CIAC bulletins. If you are not part of these communities, please contact your agency's response team to report incidents. Your agency's team will coordinate with CIAC. The Forum of Incident Response and Security Teams (FIRST) is a world-wide organization. A list of FIRST member organizations and their constituencies can be obtained via WWW at http://www.first.org/. This document was prepared as an account of work sponsored by an agency of the United States Government. Neither the United States Government nor the University of California nor any of their employees, makes any warranty, express or implied, or assumes any legal liability or responsibility for the accuracy, completeness, or usefulness of any information, apparatus, product, or process disclosed, or represents that its use would not infringe privately owned rights. Reference herein to any specific commercial products, process, or service by trade name, trademark, manufacturer, or otherwise, does not necessarily constitute or imply its endorsement, recommendation or favoring by the United States Government or the University of California. 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