Elastic has published an urgent security alert regarding a crucial weakness in Kibana, dubbed as CVE-2025-25012, which permits authenticated intruders to carry out random commands on impacted systems.
The imperfection, scoring 9.9 on the CVSS v3.1 scale, arises from a prototype corruption issue in Kibana’s system for uploading files and handling HTTP requests. The misuse of this flaw could result in total system compromise, data theft, or service interruption.
The weakness is found in how Kibana handles the uploading of files and HTTP requests. Through inserting malicious data into these workflows, attackers can alter JavaScript object prototypes, a tactic known as prototype contamination, to bypass security measures and perform arbitrary commands.
This attack pathway falls under CWE-1321 (Inadequate Control of Modifications Based on Prototypes) and aligns with the MITRE ATT&CK tactic T1059 (Interpreter for Commands and Scripts).
Versions Affected:
- Kibana 8.15.0 to 8.17.0: Vulnerable to users holding the Viewer privilege.
- Kibana 8.17.1 and 8.17.2: Requires users with fleet-all, integrations-all, and actions:execute-advanced-connectors permissions.
According to Elastic’s alert, exploiting this issue is deemed “simple” for attackers with valid login credentials, necessitating no sophisticated tools or reverse engineering.
Achieving successful exploitation enables:
- Remote Code Execution (RCE): Complete authority over Kibana servers.
- Data Breaches: Unauthorized entry to Elasticsearch clusters, API keys, and confidential logs.
- Lateral Movement: Compromised Kibana installations could function as entry points to broader systems.
The severity of this vulnerability is escalated by Kibana’s central role in logging and analysis. Entities using Kibana for security oversight (via Elastic Security) encounter heightened dangers, as attackers could deactivate alerts or alter threat detection pipelines.
Countermeasures
Elastic has unveiled Kibana 8.17.3 to rectify the vulnerability. System administrators should prioritize immediate upgrades. For setups needing interim safeguards, deactivate the Integration Assistant by including the subsequent line in kibana.yml:
This action limits potential points of attack but does not completely eliminate the threat. As of now, there are no publicly available proof-of-concept exploits.
Elastic Cloud deployments have been auto-patched, while self-managed clusters require manual interference.
Entities failing to update risk facing penalties under GDPR and HIPAA, given Kibana’s frequent handling of sensitive information. This occurrence underscores the critical necessity for live monitoring of vulnerabilities on data analysis platforms.
The article Critical Kibana Vulnerability Let Attackers Execute Arbitrary Code was first published on Cyber Security News.