CVE-2012-1823

Known exploitThis CVE is high risk and there are known public exploits leveraging this vulnerability. Address this vulnerability with high priority.

Public on

Last Modified: UTC

CriticalCritical ImpactWhat does this mean?
DescriptionStatementAdditional informationCVSS Score DetailsFAQ

Description

The CVE Program describes this issue as:

sapi/cgi/cgi_main.c in PHP before 5.3.12 and 5.4.x before 5.4.2, when configured as a CGI script (aka php-cgi), does not properly handle query strings that lack an = (equals sign) character, which allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code by placing command-line options in the query string, related to lack of skipping a certain php_getopt for the 'd' case.

Statement

This flaw did not affect the versions of PHP in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 or 4. Updates were released for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and 6 (RHSA-2012:0546, RHSA-2012:0547), Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 Long Life (RHSA-2012:0568), Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6, 6.0, and 6.1 Extended Update Support (RHSA-2012:0568, RHSA-2012:0569), and Red Hat Application Stack v2 (RHSA-2012:0570). This flaw only affected PHP CGI configurations and it did not affect the default configuration in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and 6 using the PHP module for Apache httpd to handle PHP scripts. Note that this issue was not fixed completely the first time, which resulted in the assignment of additional related CVE identifiers - CVE-2012-2311, CVE-2012-2335, and CVE-2012-2336. Refer to the Red Hat CVE Database and the Red Hat Bugzilla for additional information on how those CVEs affect Red Hat products.

This flaw did not affect the versions of PHP in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 or 4. Updates were released for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and 6 (RHSA-2012:0546, RHSA-2012:0547), Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.3 Long Life (RHSA-2012:0568), Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.6, 6.0, and 6.1 Extended Update Support (RHSA-2012:0568, RHSA-2012:0569), and Red Hat Application Stack v2 (RHSA-2012:0570).

This flaw only affected PHP CGI configurations and it did not affect the default configuration in Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 and 6 using the PHP module for Apache httpd to handle PHP scripts.

Note that this issue was not fixed completely the first time, which resulted in the assignment of additional related CVE identifiers - CVE-2012-2311, CVE-2012-2335, and CVE-2012-2336. Refer to the Red Hat CVE Database and the Red Hat Bugzilla for additional information on how those CVEs affect Red Hat products.

Additional information

  • Bugzilla 818607: php: command line arguments injection when run in CGI mode (VU#520827)
  • FAQ: Frequently asked questions about CVE-2012-1823

Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) Score Details

Important note

CVSS scores for open source components depend on vendor-specific factors (e.g. version or build chain). Therefore, Red Hat's score and impact rating can be different from NVD and other vendors. Red Hat remains the authoritative CVE Naming Authority (CNA) source for its products and services (see Red Hat classifications).

CVSS v2 Score Breakdown
Red HatNVD

CVSS v2 Base Score

6.8

7.5

Attack Vector

Network

Network

Access Complexity

Medium

Low

Authentication

None

None

Confidentiality Impact

Partial

Partial

Integrity Impact

Partial

Partial

Availability Impact

Partial

Partial

CVSS v2 Vector

Red Hat: AV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P

NVD: AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P

Frequently Asked Questions

Why is Red Hat's CVSS v3 score or Impact different from other vendors?

For open source software shipped by multiple vendors, the CVSS base scores may vary for each vendor's version depending on the version they ship, how they ship it, the platform, and even how the software is compiled. This makes scoring of vulnerabilities difficult for third-party vulnerability databases such as NVD that only provide a single CVSS base score for each vulnerability. Red Hat scores reflect how a vulnerability affects our products specifically.

For more information, see https://access.redhat.com/solutions/762393.

My product is listed as "Under investigation" or "Affected", when will Red Hat release a fix for this vulnerability?

  • "Under investigation" doesn't necessarily mean that the product is affected by this vulnerability. It only means that our Analysis Team is still working on determining whether the product is affected and how it is affected.
  • The term "Affected" means that our Analysis team has determined that this product, such as Red Hat Enterprise Linux 8 or OpenShift Container Platform 4, is affected by this vulnerability and a fix may be released to address this issue in the near future. This includes all minor releases of this product unless noted otherwise in the Statement text.

What can I do if my product is listed as "Will not fix"?

A "will not fix" status means that a fix for an affected product version is not planned or not possible due to complexity, which may create additional risk.

Available options depend mostly on the Impact of the vulnerability and the current Life Cycle phase of your product. Overall, you have the following options:
  • Upgrade to a supported product version that includes a fix for this vulnerability (recommended).
  • Apply a mitigation (if one exists).
  • Open a support case to request a prioritization of releasing a fix for this vulnerability.

What can I do if my product is listed as "Fix deferred"?

A deferred status means that a fix for an affected product version is not guaranteed due to higher-priority development work.

Available options depend mostly on the Impact of the vulnerability and the current Life Cycle phase of your product. Overall, you have the following options:
  • Apply a mitigation (if one exists).
  • Open a support case to request a prioritization of releasing a fix for this vulnerability.
  • Red Hat Engineering focuses on addressing high-priority issues based on their complexity or limited lifecycle support. Therefore, lower-priority issues will not receive immediate fixes.

What is a mitigation?

A mitigation is an action that can be taken to reduce the impact of a security vulnerability, without deploying any fixes.

I have a Red Hat product but it is not in the above list, is it affected?

The listed products were found to include one or more of the components that this vulnerability affects. These products underwent a thorough evaluation to determine their affectedness by this vulnerability. Note that layered products (such as container-based offerings) that consume affected components from any of the products listed in this table may be affected and are not represented.

Why is my security scanner reporting my product as vulnerable to this vulnerability even though my product version is fixed or not affected?

In order to maintain code stability and compatibility, Red Hat usually does not rebase packages to entirely new versions. Instead, we backport fixes and new features to an older version of the package we distribute. This can result in some security scanners that only consider the package version to report the package as vulnerable. To avoid this, we suggest that you use an approved vulnerability scanner from our Red Hat Vulnerability Scanner Certification program.

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