Overview
This blog post highlights a critical vulnerability, CVE-2025-33076, affecting IBM Engineering Systems Design Rhapsody versions 9.0.2, 10.0, and 10.0.1. The vulnerability is a stack-based buffer overflow that can lead to arbitrary code execution. Any organization utilizing these versions of IBM Rhapsody could potentially be at risk, making this an issue of considerable concern. The severity of the vulnerability and its potential for misuse necessitates immediate attention and action.
Vulnerability Summary
CVE ID: CVE-2025-33076
Severity: High (8.8 CVSS Score)
Attack Vector: Local
Privileges Required: Low
User Interaction: Required
Impact: Arbitrary code execution, potential system compromise or data leakage
Affected Products
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Product | Affected Versions
IBM Engineering Systems Design Rhapsody | 9.0.2
IBM Engineering Systems Design Rhapsody | 10.0
IBM Engineering Systems Design Rhapsody | 10.0.1
How the Exploit Works
The vulnerability arises from improper bounds checking in the affected versions of IBM Rhapsody. This flaw allows a local user to overflow the buffer by inputting more data than the buffer can handle. This overflow of data can overwrite other memory locations, leading to the corruption of valid data and the execution of arbitrary code.
Conceptual Example Code
Below is a simplified, conceptual representation of how the buffer overflow might be exploited. This is a hypothetical scenario and is not an actual exploit.
# A long string of "A" characters
payload = 'A' * 2000
# A hypothetical command that triggers the overflow
command = '/usr/bin/IBM-Rhapsody --input ' + payload
# Execute the command
os.system(command)In this example, `payload` is a string that is longer than the buffer in the IBM Rhapsody application can handle. When the application attempts to store this string in the buffer, it overflows, potentially overwriting memory addresses and leading to arbitrary code execution.
Please note this is only a conceptual example and does not represent a real-world exploit. The actual exploitation of this vulnerability would likely involve complex control of the memory overflow to execute specific code.
Mitigation Guidance
IBM has released a patch to address this vulnerability. Users are strongly advised to apply this patch immediately. If applying the patch is not immediately possible, users can consider using a Web Application Firewall (WAF) or Intrusion Detection System (IDS) as a temporary measure to detect and prevent possible exploits. However, these measures should only be seen as temporary fixes and not a substitute for applying the vendor-provided patch.