Summary
On June 3, Cybersecurity researchers Sina Kheirkhah of Summoning Team and Soroush Dalili successfully completed a proof of concept exploit leveraging two vulnerabilities, CVE-2024-4358 and CVE-2024-1800. These vulnerabilities affect Progress Telerik Report Server and allow remote code execution utilizing deserialization and authentication bypass.
Impact Assessment
These vulnerabilities affect version 10.0.24.305 and earlier of Progress Telerik Report Server. They allow an exploit through deserialization that results in remote code execution. The CVSS 3.1 score for these vulnerabilities is 9.9––an extremely high severity.
A thorough root cause analysis and proof of concept code explanation is publicly available through GitHub and the Summoning Team’s blog.
Remediation
Update to the latest version of Telerik report server 10.1.24.514 or later to remediate this vulnerability.
A temporary mitigation is available if upgrading is not immediately feasible. The mitigation requires the URL Rewrite IIS module from Microsoft.
See below for details or navigate to the Telerik Report Server Advisory for CVE-2024-4358.
Figure 1 Telerik Server Mitigation (https://docs.telerik.com/report-server/knowledge-base/registration-auth-bypass-cve-2024-4358)
Fully install and configure the Report Server before adding this URL Rewrite rule so as not to hinder the initial setup.
What It Means for You
If you or your organization utilizes Telerik Report Server, it is paramount to apply updates and/or mitigations as soon as possible. Once exploit code has been made available, the likelihood of a threat actor exploit is considerably higher.
Business Implications
If this vulnerability is exploited, an attacker can perform remote code execution with no authentication required. An attacker could create a backdoor into the Telerik Report Server, alter or exfiltrate data, and generate malicious reports. Data, reputational, and monetary loss could follow.
Recommendations
In this case, two vulnerabilities were successfully leveraged to perform a proof-of-concept exploit against the Telerik Report Server. This time, it was security researchers, but this could have just as easily been exploited by threat actors. It is paramount that high CVSS score, critical vulnerabilities are patched in a timely manner. Typically, it is best to apply these patches within 0-14 days of release depending on the severity of the vulnerability. This should be discussed with the leadership and security team(s) responsible for patching and vulnerability remediation. An agreed upon standard and procedure for patching vulnerabilities in a timely manner must be created to ensure exploits such as these are not leveraged against your organization.
Patching is always the best way to remediate. Fortunately, a patch is available to remediate the two vulnerabilities associated with this exploit chain.
If patching is not immediately feasible, follow the mitigation process provided by the vendor to temporarily protect the server from attack until a patch can be applied.
Associated Bulletins
https://github.com/sinsinology/CVE-2024-4358?tab=readme-ov-file
https://summoning.team/blog/progress-report-server-rce-cve-2024-4358-cve-2024-1800/
https://docs.telerik.com/report-server/knowledge-base/deserialization-vulnerability-cve-2024-1800
https://docs.telerik.com/report-server/knowledge-base/registration-auth-bypass-cve-2024-4358