Symantec NetBackup PureDisk: Non-Privileged User Authentication Bypass Elevation of Privilege

Symantec discovered a security issue in Symantec's Veritas NetBackup 6.0 PureDisk Remote Office Edition. An unauthorized user with access to the network and the server hosting the management interface can potentially bypass the management interface authentication to gain access and elevate their privileges on the system

Severity
Medium (highly dependent on network configuration)

Affected Products

Note: For systems running NetBackup 6.0 GA PureDisk Remote Office Edition it will be necessary to install Maintenance Pack 1 (NB_PDE_60_MP1_283808) prior to applying this Security Pack (NB_PDE_60_MP1_P01). This issue ONLY affects the product and versions listed above.

Details
An internal review revealed a potential elevation of privilege issue in the Symantec Veritas NetBackup PureDisk management interface. The management interface is accessible only through an SSL web connection by default. However it is possible for a non-privileged user with access to the network and the server hosting the Symantec Veritas NetBackup PureDisk management interface, to bypass the management interface authentication and further leverage their access to elevate privileged access on the server.

A CVE Candidate name is being requested from the Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) initiative for this issue. This advisory will be revised accordingly upon receipt of the CVE Candidate name. This issue is a candidate for inclusion in the CVE list (http://cve.mitre.org), which standardizes names for security problems.

Symantec Response
Symantec engineers have addressed the issues identified above and made Security updates available.
Symantec strongly recommends all customers apply the latest security update to protect against threats of this nature.
Symantec knows of no exploitation of or adverse customer impact from these issues.

The patches listed above for affected products are available through the following location:
http://support.veritas.com/docs/284734 for Symantec Veritas NetBackup PureDisk Remote Office Edition.

Best Practices
As part of normal best practices, Symantec recommends:

• Restrict access to administration or management systems to authorized privileged users only
• Block remote access to all ports not essential for efficient operation
• Restrict remote access, if required, to trusted/authorized systems only
• Remove/disable unnecessary accounts or restrict access according to security policy as required
• Run under the principle of least privilege where possible
• Keep all operating systems and applications updated with the latest vendor patches
• Follow a multi-layered approach to security. Run both firewall and antivirus applications, at a minimum, to provide multiple points of detection and protection to both inbound and outbound threats
• Deploy network intrusion detection systems to monitor network traffic for signs of anomalous or suspicious activity. This may aid in detection of attacks or malicious activity related to exploitation of latest vulnerabilities

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