A newly disclosed critical vulnerability in SUSE Manager has raised urgent security concerns across enterprise environments, as the flaw allows unauthorized attackers to execute arbitrary commands with root privileges on affected systems.
The vulnerability, designated CVE-2025-46811, has been assigned a CVSS score of 9.3, placing it in the critical severity category.
Vulnerability Details and Attack Vector
The security flaw stems from a Missing Authentication for Critical Function weakness that affects SUSE Manager’s websocket communication system.
Specifically, attackers can exploit the /rhn/websocket/minion/remote-commands endpoint to execute commands without proper authentication verification.
This represents a significant security oversight that bypasses fundamental access controls designed to protect system integrity.
The vulnerability’s attack vector is particularly concerning because it can be exploited remotely over the network with low complexity and requires no user interaction.
Attackers need no special privileges to initiate the exploit, making it accessible to a wide range of potential threat actors.
The WebSocket interface, typically used for real-time communication between the SUSE Manager server and managed systems, becomes a gateway for unauthorized administrative access.
Affected Systems and Versions
The vulnerability impacts multiple SUSE Manager configurations and deployment scenarios.
Container deployments using suse/manager/5.0/x86_64/server:5.0.5.7.30.1 are vulnerable across various components that require updates to specific patch levels.
The flaw also affects SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 15 SP4 Manager Server images across multiple cloud platforms, including Amazon EC2, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Engine BYOS (Bring Your Subscription) deployments.
SUSE Manager Server Module 4.3 installations are similarly at risk, with multiple components requiring immediate attention.
The widespread nature of the affected systems indicates that organizations using SUSE Manager for infrastructure management face significant exposure until patches are applied.
Security Implications and Risk Assessment
The critical nature of this vulnerability cannot be overstated. Root-level command execution represents the highest possible privilege escalation, essentially granting attackers complete control over compromised systems.
This level of access enables threat actors to install malware, exfiltrate sensitive data, modify system configurations, and potentially pivot to other connected systems within the network infrastructure.
For organizations relying on SUSE Manager for centralized system administration, this vulnerability effectively undermines the security of their entire managed infrastructure.
The lack of authentication requirements means that any network-accessible SUSE Manager instance could be compromised by opportunistic attackers scanning for vulnerable endpoints.
Immediate Response Required
Organizations running affected SUSE Manager versions should prioritize immediate patching to address this critical vulnerability.
System administrators should verify their current software versions against the affected components list and apply the specified updates without delay.
Until patches can be deployed, network-level restrictions around the vulnerable WebSocket endpoint may provide temporary mitigation, though complete remediation requires updating to the patched versions.
The discovery and disclosure of CVE-2025-46811 underscore the ongoing importance of robust authentication mechanisms in enterprise management platforms and highlight the critical need for comprehensive security testing of administrative interfaces.
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