cbcvebase.
CVE-2012-3569
published 2012-11-14

CVE-2012-3569: Format string vulnerability in VMware OVF Tool 2.1 on Windows, as used in VMware Workstation 8.x before 8.0.5, VMware Player 4.x before 4.0.5, and other…

PriorityP265critical9.3CVSS 2.0
AVNACMAuNCCICAC
EXPLOIT
EPSS
47.72%
98.7th percentile
Format string vulnerability in VMware OVF Tool 2.1 on Windows, as used in VMware Workstation 8.x before 8.0.5, VMware Player 4.x before 4.0.5, and other products, allows user-assisted remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via a crafted OVF file.

Affected

18 ranges
VendorProductVersion rangeFixed in
vmwareesxi
vmwareovf_tool
vmwareplayer
vmwareplayer
vmwareplayer
vmwareplayer
vmwareplayer
vmwareplayer
vmwarevcenter_server
vmwarevmware_workstation
vmwarevsphere
vmwareworkstation
vmwareworkstation
vmwareworkstation
vmwareworkstation
vmwareworkstation
vmwareworkstation
vmwareworkstation

Detection & IOCsextracted from sources · hover to see the quote

filenamevmware-ovftool-2.1.0-467744-win-i386.msi
other0x7852753d (call esp, MSVCR90.dll 9.00.30729.4148)
bytes
\x54\x59 (push esp; pop ecx encoder prepend)
  • Detect exploit delivery by inspecting HTTP User-Agent for both 'VMware-client' and 'ovfTool' strings, which the Metasploit module checks for before serving the malicious OVF payload.
  • Flag HTTP responses with Content-Type 'text/xml' served to VMware OVF Tool user-agents, as the exploit delivers the malicious OVF file via this content type.
  • Monitor for requests to URLs ending in '.mf' from VMware OVF Tool clients, which is a behavioural indicator of OVF file parsing activity that accompanies exploit attempts.
  • The exploit targets a 'call esp' gadget at 0x7852753d in MSVCR90.dll version 9.00.30729.4148 (installed with VMware OVF Tools 2.1); presence of this DLL version on a system indicates a vulnerable target.
  • The vulnerability is triggered during parsing of a malformed OVF file; inspect OVF files for format string specifiers (e.g., %n, %x, %s) in fields that would appear in error messages.
  • Post-exploitation, the Metasploit module auto-runs 'migrate -f'; monitor for unexpected process migration activity following vmware-ovftool.exe execution.
  • ·The exploit has only been tested on Windows XP SP3 with VMware OVF Tools 2.1 (installer: vmware-ovftool-2.1.0-467744-win-i386.msi); the ROP gadget address (0x7852753d) is specific to MSVCR90.dll 9.00.30729.4148 and will not be reliable on other OS/DLL versions.
  • ·The payload excludes bytes 0x00–0x08, 0x0b, 0x0c, 0x0e, 0x0f, 0x10–0x1f, 0x80–0xff, and 0x22 as bad characters; detection signatures based on shellcode byte patterns must account for this encoding constraint.
  • ·The browser-based variant (exploit-db 24460) requires the victim to open a URL served by the attacker's HTTP listener, while the file-based variant (exploit-db 24461) requires the victim to open a crafted .ovf file directly; detection strategies differ between the two delivery methods.
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