CVE-2022-42889 and AXA

Products

• CA App Experience Analytics
• CA Application Experience Analytics SaaS (AXA)

Issue/Introduction

CVE-2022-42889 was published in the National Vulnerability Database on 13 October, 2022.  More information can be found at https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2022-42889

The vulnerability is caused with the use of Apache Commons Text 1.5 through 1.9. 

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The vulnerability is visible only in AXA SaaS 22.8 and in the next on-Prem 22.1, not in the previous AXA versions.

Vulnerability Description: Apache Commons Text performs variable interpolation, allowing properties to be dynamically evaluated and expanded.

The standard format for interpolation is "${prefix:name}", where "prefix" is used to locate an instance of org.apache.commons.text.lookup.StringLookup that performs the interpolation.

Starting with version 1.5 and continuing through 1.9, the set of default Lookup instances included interpolators that could result in arbitrary code execution or contact with remote servers.

These lookups are: - "script" - execute expressions using the JVM script execution engine (javax.script) - "dns" - resolve dns records - "url" - load values from urls, including from remote servers Applications using the interpolation defaults in the affected versions may be vulnerable to remote code execution or unintentional contact with remote servers if untrusted configuration values are used.

Users are recommended to upgrade to Apache Commons Text 1.10.0, which disables the problematic interpolators by default.

Resolution

This vulnerability is false positive because AXA is not using the Apache commons-text itself in the source code and also not using StringSubstitutor, not find any references for these in the AXA codebase.