Vulnerability Monitor

The vendors, products, and vulnerabilities you care about

CVE-2018-16791


In SolarWinds SFTP/SCP Server through 2018-09-10, the configuration file is world readable and writable, and stores user passwords in an insecure manner, allowing an attacker to determine passwords for potentially privileged accounts. This also grants the attacker an ability to backdoor the server.


Security Impact Summary

This vulnerability carries a CRITICAL severity rating with a CVSS v3.1 score of 9.8, indicating it can be exploited remotely over the network with relatively low complexity without requiring user interaction and does not require pre-existing privileges . The vulnerability impacts confidentiality (data exposure), integrity (unauthorized modifications), and availability (service disruption) for affected systems. Impacting 1 product from solarwinds organizations running these solutions should prioritize assessment and patching.

Historical Context

First disclosed in 2018, this vulnerability was reported during a period defined by widespread IoT adoption challenges, mobile security concerns, and the emergence of advanced persistent threat (APT) techniques. Contemporary mitigation strategies focused on secure development practices and third-party component vetting.


Published

2018-12-05T22:29:00.227

Last Modified

2024-11-21T03:53:21.580

Status

Modified

Source

[email protected]

Severity

CVSSv3.0: 9.8 (CRITICAL)

CVSSv2 Vector

AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N

  • Access Vector: NETWORK
  • Access Complexity: LOW
  • Authentication: NONE
  • Confidentiality Impact: PARTIAL
  • Integrity Impact: NONE
  • Availability Impact: NONE
Exploitability Score

10.0

Impact Score

2.9

Weaknesses
  • Type: Primary
    CWE-522

Affected Vendors & Products
Type Vendor Product Version/Range Vulnerable?
Application solarwinds sftp\/scp_server ≤ 20180910 Yes

References

How SecUtils Interprets This CVE

SecUtils normalizes and enriches National Vulnerability Database (NVD) records by standardizing vendor and product identifiers, aggregating vulnerability metadata from both NVD and MITRE sources, and providing structured context for security teams. For solarwinds's affected products, we extract Common Platform Enumeration (CPE) data, Common Weakness Enumeration (CWE) classifications, CVSS severity metrics, and reference data to enable rapid vulnerability prioritization and asset correlation. This record contains no exploit code, proof-of-concept instructions, or attack methodologies—only defensive intelligence necessary for patch management, risk assessment, and security operations.