Patch Now: Up to 900K MikroTik Routers Vulnerable to Total Takeover

[itman 1,742]

Quote

Up to 900,00 MikroTik routers — a popular target for threat actors including nation-state groups — may be open to attack via a privilege escalation vulnerability in the RouterOS operating system.

The vulnerability (CVE-2023-30788) gives attackers a way to take complete control of affected MIPS-processor-based MikroTik devices and pivot into an organization's network, according to researchers from VulnCheck, which just published several new exploits for the flaw. Attackers can also use it to enable man-in-the-middle attacks on network traffic flowing through the router, they warned. Versions of MikroTik RouterOS stable before 6.49.7 and long-term through 6.48.6 are vulnerable to the issue.

"The worst-case scenario is that an attacker can install and execute arbitrary tools on the underlying Linux operating system," says Jacob Baines, leader researcher at VulnCheck. "Remote and authenticated attackers can use the vulnerability to get a root shell on the router," by escalating admin-level privileges to that of a super-administrator.

MikroTik has released a fix for impacted RouterOS versions, and admins should apply it quickly.

https://www.darkreading.com/vulnerabilities-threats/up-to-900k-mikrotik-routers-vulnerable-total-takeover

Edited July 26, 2023 by itman

[Nightowl 206]

4 years before I had a client with Mikrotek , one of the worst experiences I had with a router/firewall..

[karlisi 26]

Most of our network is based on Mikrotik products. No worse or better than other systems.

As of this vulnerability, it's exploitable only if malicious person has administrative access to device, so, this is the main problem. Here is what Mikrotik says about it

https://blog.mikrotik.com/security/cve-2023-30799.html

Edited July 27, 2023 by karlisi

[Nightowl 206]

29 minutes ago, karlisi said:

Most of our network is based on Mikrotik products. No worse or better than other systems.

As of this vulnerability, it's exploitable only if malicious person has administrative access to device, so, this is the main problem. Here is what Mikrotik says about it

https://blog.mikrotik.com/security/cve-2023-30799.html

Indeed it's just my opinion , many will disagree with me , and true vulnerabilities happen to all , but I just found other brands easier to work with.

Edited July 27, 2023 by Nightowl

[itman 1,742]

Here's the full technical details on the vulnerability: https://margin.re/2022/06/pulling-mikrotik-into-the-limelight/ .

The issue is that privilege escalation can occur from admin level to "God mode" level.