Overview
Cybersecurity threats are continually evolving, and one such threat that has been identified recently is the CVE-2025-55116 vulnerability. This security flaw is a buffer overflow vulnerability found in the Control-M/Agent, which can lead to a local privilege escalation if an attacker gains access to the system running the Agent. This vulnerability is significant as it can potentially compromise the entire system or lead to data leakage. Given the severity of the potential impact, it’s essential to understand the nature of this vulnerability, its effects, and the mitigation measures available.
Vulnerability Summary
CVE ID: CVE-2025-55116
Severity: High (CVSS: 8.8)
Attack Vector: Local
Privileges Required: Low
User Interaction: None
Impact: Potential system compromise or data leakage
Affected Products
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Product | Affected Versions
Control-M/Agent | 9.0.18 to 9.0.20 and potentially earlier unsupported versions
How the Exploit Works
The vulnerability is caused by a buffer overflow in the Control-M/Agent. A buffer overflow occurs when more data is put into a buffer or holding area than the buffer can handle. This over-run of data can overwrite other data values or even execute malicious commands. In this case, an attacker with access to the system running the Agent can exploit this vulnerability to escalate their privileges within the system, potentially gaining full control over the affected system or leading to data leakage.
Conceptual Example Code
The following is a conceptual representation of how the vulnerability might be exploited. This is not a working example but meant to illustrate the potential exploit.
$ ./controlm_agent -buffer_overflow `perl -e 'print "A"x1024'`In this example, the command is running the Control-M/Agent with a buffer_overflow option followed by a string of “A” characters that is longer than what the buffer can handle, potentially leading to a buffer overflow and privilege escalation.
Recommended Mitigation
It is recommended to apply the vendor patch to mitigate this vulnerability. If the patch cannot be applied immediately, a temporary mitigation strategy can be the use of a Web Application Firewall (WAF) or Intrusion Detection System (IDS) to detect and prevent exploitation of this vulnerability. However, these are not long-term solutions and the vendor patch should be applied as soon as possible to fully secure the system.
