CVE-2021-45492 Privilege escalation in n/a

High 7.8 Published 14 Jul 2022 Updated 4 Aug 2024

Unprivileged users can escalate privileges to SYSTEM via DLL hijacking due to weak permissions on the installation directory in the system PATH.

Exploited in the wild: Not known
Login needed: Any signed-in user
Attackable: Local or same network only
Victim action needed: Not needed
Fix: None listed

What is CVE-2021-45492?

CVE-2021-45492 is a high-severity vulnerability in n/a, published on 14 Jul 2022. It can only be exploited from the same machine or local network, with no action from the victim.

Official description

In Sage 300 ERP (formerly accpac) through 6.8.x, the installer configures the C:\Sage\Sage300\Runtime directory to be the first entry in the system-wide PATH environment variable. However, this directory is writable by unprivileged users because the Sage installer fails to set explicit permissions and therefore inherits weak permissions from the C:\ folder. Because entries in the system-wide PATH variable are included in the search order for DLLs, an attacker could perform DLL search-order hijacking to escalate their privileges to SYSTEM. Furthermore, if the Global Search or Web Screens functionality is enabled, then privilege escalation is possible via the GlobalSearchService and Sage.CNA.WindowsService services, again via DLL search-order hijacking because unprivileged users would have modify permissions on the application directory. Note that while older versions of the software default to installing in %PROGRAMFILES(X86)% (which would allow the Sage folder to inherit strong permissions, making the installation not vulnerable), the official Sage 300 installation guides for those versions recommend installing in C:\Sage, which would make the installation vulnerable.

Weakness: CWE-732

Which versions are affected by CVE-2021-45492?

It affects 1 product.

Products include Sage Sage 300.

How do I fix CVE-2021-45492?

No fix has been published for CVE-2021-45492 yet. Limit exposure of the affected software until one is available.

Is CVE-2021-45492 being exploited?

There is no known exploitation of CVE-2021-45492 in the wild and no public exploit code.

Sources

Also known as GHSA-gw28-7ffr-r8wm.