CVE-2023-36827: Fides vulnerable to Path Traversal in Webserver API

Published Jul 5, 2023
·
Updated

Impact A path traversal (directory traversal) vulnerability affects fides versions lower than 2.15.1, allowing remote attackers to access arbitrary files on the fides webserver container's filesystem.

Patches The vulnerability is patched in fides 2.15.1. Users should upgrade to this version.

Workarounds If the Fides webserver API is not directly accessible to attackers and is instead deployed behind a reverse proxy as recommended in Ethyca's security best practice documentation, and the reverse proxy is an AWS application load balancer, the vulnerability can't be exploited by these attackers. An AWS application load balancer will reject this attack with a 400 error.

Additionally, any secrets supplied to the container using environment variables rather than a fides.toml configuration file are not affected by this vulnerability.

Other sources

Fides is an open-source privacy engineering platform for managing the fulfillment of data privacy requests in a runtime environment, and the enforcement of privacy regulations in code. A path traversal (directory traversal) vulnerability affects fides versions lower than version 2.15.1, allowing remote attackers to access arbitrary files on the fides webserver container's filesystem. The vulnerability is patched in fides 2.15.1.

If the Fides webserver API is not directly accessible to attackers and is instead deployed behind a reverse proxy as recommended in Ethyca's security best practice documentation, and the reverse proxy is an AWS application load balancer, the vulnerability can't be exploited by these attackers. An AWS application load balancer will reject this attack with a 400 error. Additionally, any secrets supplied to the container using environment variables rather than a fides.toml configuration file are not affected by this vulnerability.

Affected Software

2 affected componentsFixes available
Ethyca Fides<2.15.1
pip/ethyca-fides<2.15.1
2.15.1

Remediation

Recommended actions to resolve this vulnerability, in priority order.

  1. Upgrade

    Upgrade pip/ethyca-fides to a version that resolves this vulnerability.

    Fixed in 2.15.1
  2. Upgrade

    Upgrade fides to a version that resolves this vulnerability.

    Fixed in 2.15.1
  3. Compensating control

    Ensure the Fides webserver API is not directly accessible to attackers; deploy it behind a reverse proxy as recommended, specifically using an AWS application load balancer, which will reject the attack with a 400 error.

Event History

Jul 5, 2023
CVE Published
via MITRE·09:22 PM
Data Sourced
via MITRE·09:22 PM
DescriptionSeverityWeakness
Data Sourced
via NVD·10:15 PM
RemedyDescriptionSeverityWeaknessAffected Software
Jul 6, 2023
Advisory Published
08:40 PM

Frequently Asked Questions

1

What is CVE-2023-36827?

CVE-2023-36827 is a path traversal (directory traversal) vulnerability in Fides, an open-source privacy engineering platform, affecting versions lower than 2.15.1.

2

How severe is CVE-2023-36827?

CVE-2023-36827 has a severity score of 7.5, which is considered high.

3

How does CVE-2023-36827 affect Fides?

CVE-2023-36827 allows remote attackers to read arbitrary files on the server due to a path traversal vulnerability in Fides prior to version 2.15.1.

4

How can I fix CVE-2023-36827?

To fix CVE-2023-36827, you should update Fides to version 2.15.1 or higher.

5

Is there any additional information about CVE-2023-36827?

For more information about CVE-2023-36827, you can refer to the following references: [GitHub commit](https://github.com/ethyca/fides/commit/f526d9ffb176006d701493c9d0eff6b4884e811f), [GitHub release](https://github.com/ethyca/fides/releases/tag/2.15.1), [GitHub security advisory](https://github.com/ethyca/fides/security/advisories/GHSA-r25m-cr6v-p9hq).

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