VMware warns customers to immediately patch critical Aria network software holes

VMware is advising customers to upgrade or patch its Aria for Network Operations software because of potential security problems.

VMware Aria is the vendor’s multi-cloud management platform that integrates previously separate VMware services such as vRealize Automation, vRealize Operations, vRealize Network Insight, and CloudHealth. A single Aria Hub console provides centralized views and controls and lets customers see and manage the entire multi-cloud environment.

The vulnerabilities are in Aria Operations for Networks, a monitoring component that can find the cause of application delays based on TCP traffic latency and retransmissions and trigger alerts on the applications dashboard.

Specifically, VMware said Aria Operations for Networks contains two vulnerabilities. The first and most severe is an Authentication Bypass weakness due to a lack of unique cryptographic key generation. VMware rated this issue in the “critical severity range” with a maximum Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) score of 9.8 out of 10. The second is an arbitrary file write vulnerability, which has a CVSS threat score of 7.2. 

With the authentication weakness, a malicious actor with network access to Aria Operations for Networks could bypass Secure Sockets Shell (SSH) authentication to gain access to the Aria Operations for Networks command line interface, which could unleash all manner of control problems, VMware stated.

With the file write vulnerability, an authenticated attacker with administrative access to VMware Aria Operations for Networks can write files to arbitrary locations resulting in remote code execution, VMware stated.

VMware warned that Aria Operations for Networks On-Prem versions 6.2 / 6.3 / 6.4 / 6.5.1 / 6.6 / 6.7 / 6.8 / 6.9 / 6.10 are impacted by the vulnerabilities and said that upgrading to version 6.11 fixes the problems. Customers can also download patches for the vulnerabilities here.