CVE-2023-52424

Public on

Last Modified: UTC

Description

A flaw was found in the IEEE 802.11 standard. This vulnerability possibly allows an adversary to trick a victim into connecting to an unintended or untrusted network because the SSID is not always used to derive the pairwise master key or session keys and because there is not a protected exchange of an SSID during a 4-way handshake.

Statement

This vulnerability affects networks using the WEP, WPA3 SAE-loop, 802.1x/EAP, FILS, and Mesh AMPE authentication protocols, arising from a design flaw in the WiFi standard IEEE 802.11 allows attackers to trick victims into connecting to less secure networks and intercept their traffic. This significantly impacts Confidentiality, as sensitive data can be intercepted. Integrity is compromised because attackers can alter intercepted data. Availability is also affected, as the attack exploits the auto-disconnect feature in certain VPN clients, causing the VPN to disable when the device connects to a predefined “trusted” WiFi network, leaving the user unprotected. The impact is Moderate, because of the attack limitations: credentials of the valid WiFi network and malicious one suppose to be the same.

Mitigation

Avoid Credential Reuse: One of the key recommendations is to avoid reusing credentials across different SSIDs. Each network should have unique credentials to prevent attackers from easily setting up rogue networks with matching authentication details.

Additional information

  • Bugzilla 2282013: 802.11: SSID Confusion attack
  • CWE-304: Missing Critical Step in Authentication
  • FAQ: Frequently asked questions about CVE-2023-52424

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).

The following CVSS metrics and score provided are preliminary and subject to review.

CVSS v3 Score Breakdown
Red HatNVD

CVSS v3 Base Score

7.4

N/A

Attack Vector

Adjacent Network

N/A

Attack Complexity

Low

N/A

Privileges Required

Low

N/A

User Interaction

Required

N/A

Scope

Unchanged

N/A

Confidentiality Impact

High

N/A

Integrity Impact

High

N/A

Availability Impact

High

N/A

CVSS v3 Vector

Red Hat: CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

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.
  • "Affected" means that our Analysis Team has determined that this product is affected by this vulnerability and might release a fix to address this in the near future.

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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