Nokia has disclosed a critical authentication bypass vulnerability in CloudBand Infrastructure Software (CBIS) 22 and Nokia Container Service (NCS) 22.12 APIs, rated 9.6 under CVSS v3.1 (AV:A/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H).
An attacker can send a specially crafted HTTP header to the Nginx Podman container’s authentication logic, causing it to accept unauthorized requests.
This flaw exposes management API endpoints under /api/v1/management, allowing unauthenticated users to perform restricted operations such as exporting configurations, managing user accounts, and orchestrating services.
The ability to access these sensitive functions without credentials poses severe risks to network integrity and confidentiality.
Technical Exploitation Mechanism in Nginx
The root cause lies within the /etc/nginx/conf.d/auth.conf file inside the Podman container. A conditional check uses an uninitialized variable when parsing nonstandard header values, defaulting the authentication flow to a permissive branch.
Exploitation requires sending HTTP requests with a header, for example X-Auth-Bypass: <token>, to management API endpoints.
Once authentication is bypassed, threat actors can retrieve configuration backups, modify network slice parameters, and create backdoor administrator accounts.
In multi-tenant or service provider environments, such unauthorized access enables malicious configuration injection, data exfiltration, and lateral movement to core network elements.
Comprehensive Impact Analysis of Exploitation
Successful exploitation grants complete control over orchestration and management functions. Attackers could disrupt service provisioning by altering slice configurations, disabling critical monitoring, or extracting sensitive topology data.
The compromise breaks the trust boundary of the management network, facilitating privilege escalation on underlying virtualized network functions and pivoting to other management interfaces.
Given that CBIS and NCS Manager APIs often reside within private management VLANs, the vulnerability’s impact extends across enterprise and carrier-grade infrastructures, threatening the availability and confidentiality of mission-critical network services.
Mitigation Strategies and Recommended Actions
Nokia has released patches in CBIS 22 FP1 MP1.2 and NCS 22.12 MP3 to enforce strict header validation and mandate mutual TLS for management API calls. Organizations should upgrade to these versions immediately.
As interim measures, restrict access to management APIs by applying firewall rules that limit inbound traffic to trusted IP ranges and disable external access to the Podman container’s management interface.
Enable detailed Nginx logging to detect anomalous header values or unauthenticated requests against /api/v1/management. Continuous monitoring and alerting on failed authentication attempts will aid in identifying exploitation in real time.
For further assistance, contact Nokia PSIRT at [email protected] or your Nokia Customer Support representative.
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