CVE-2023-50164-Struts – File Upload Remote Code Execution

Summary

“An attacker can manipulate file upload params to enable paths traversal and under some circumstances this can lead to uploading a malicious file which can be used to perform Remote Code Execution.”

The affected versions range from apache:struts 2.0.0 to 2.5.32, and versions 6.0.0 to 6.1.2.1.

Impact

Should this vulnerability be exploited and privileges are escalated via RCE then the potential for damage/sabotage/data theft is extremely high and as such, this should be treated with the critical severity (9.8) rating it has been given.

Risk

The 9.8 rating is warranted, this vulnerability is relatively easy to exploit and if the correct security protocols haven’t been followed then “Web servers, FTP servers, and similar servers may store a set of files underneath a “root” directory that is accessible to the server’s users. Applications may store sensitive files underneath this root without also using access control to limit which users may request those files, if any. Alternately, an application might package multiple files or directories into an archive file (e.g., ZIP or tar), but the application might not exclude sensitive files that are underneath those directories.

In cloud technologies and containers, this weakness might present itself in the form of misconfigured storage accounts that can be read or written by a public or anonymous user.”

Solution

If you have one of the affected versions of Apache Struts then updating to versions Struts 2.5.33 or Struts 6.3.0.2 or greater should fix this issue.