Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance SNMP Remote Code Execution Vulnerability

A vulnerability in the Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) code of Cisco Adaptive Security Appliance (ASA) Software could allow an authenticated, remote attacker to cause a reload of the affected system or to remotely execute code.

The vulnerability is due to a buffer overflow in the affected code area. The vulnerability affects all versions of SNMP (versions 1, 2c, and 3) when enabled on a virtual or physical Cisco ASA device. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending crafted SNMP packets to an SNMP-enabled interface on the affected system. An exploit could allow the attacker to execute arbitrary code and obtain full control of the system or to cause a reload of the affected system. The attacker must know the SNMP community string to exploit this vulnerability.

Note: Only traffic directed to the affected system can be used to exploit this vulnerability. This vulnerability affects systems configured in routed and transparent firewall mode only and in single or multiple context mode. This vulnerability can be triggered by IPv4 traffic only. The attacker requires knowledge of the configured SNMP community string in SNMP version 1 and SNMP version 2c or a valid username and password for SNMP version 3.

Cisco has released software updates that address this vulnerability. Mitigations are listed in the Workarounds section of this advisory.

This advisory is available at the following link:

https://sec.cloudapps.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-20160817-asa-snmp[“https://sec.cloudapps.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-20160817-asa-snmp”]