cbcvebase.
CVE-2019-0948
published 2019-06-12

CVE-2019-0948: An information disclosure vulnerability exists in the Windows Event Viewer (eventvwr.msc) when it improperly parses XML input containing a reference to an…

PriorityP276medium4.7CVSS 3.1
AVLACHPRNUIRSUCHINAN
ITWEXPLOITVulnCheck KEV
Exploited in the wild
EPSS
12.67%
95.8th percentile
An information disclosure vulnerability exists in the Windows Event Viewer (eventvwr.msc) when it improperly parses XML input containing a reference to an external entity. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could read arbitrary files via an XML external entity (XXE) declaration. To exploit the vulnerability, an attacker could create a file containing specially crafted XML content and convince an authenticated user to import the file. The update addresses the vulnerability by modifying the way that the Event Viewer parses XML input.

Affected

48 ranges· showing 25
VendorProductVersion rangeFixed in
microsoftwindows_10
microsoftwindows_10
microsoftwindows_10
microsoftwindows_10
microsoftwindows_10
microsoftwindows_10
microsoftwindows_10_version_1507>= 10.0.10240.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_10_version_1607>= 10.0.14393.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_10_version_1703>= 10.0.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_10_version_1709>= 10.0.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_10_version_1709_for_32-bit_systems>= 10.0.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_10_version_1803>= 10.0.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_10_version_1809>= 10.0.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_10_version_1809>= 10.0.17763.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_10_version_1903_for_32-bit_systems>= 10.0.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_10_version_1903_for_arm64-based_systems>= 10.0.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_10_version_1903_for_x64-based_systems>= 10.0.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_7>= 6.1.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_7_service_pack_1>= 6.1.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_8.1>= 6.3.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_server_2008
microsoftwindows_server_2008_r2_service_pack_1>= 6.1.7601.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_server_2008_r2_systems_service_pack_1>= 6.1.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_server_2008_service_pack_2>= 6.0.0 < publicationpublication
microsoftwindows_server_2008_service_pack_2>= 6.0.6003.0 < publicationpublication

Detection & IOCsextracted from sources · hover to see the quote

filenameMyCustomView.xml
filenamepayload.dtd
pathc:\windows\win.ini
filenamexml.dtd
processeventvwr.msc
  • Monitor Windows Event Viewer (eventvwr.msc) for 'Import Custom View' actions where the imported XML file contains DOCTYPE declarations or external entity references (XXE payload pattern).
  • Detect outbound HTTP GET requests originating from eventvwr.msc or mmc.exe to external servers, especially carrying file content as a query parameter — indicative of XXE-based file exfiltration.
  • Alert on .msc files delivered via email, USB, or remote share that contain URLs in the StringsTables section pointing to external servers, as this is the XSS/SMB-relay attack vector.
  • Detect SMB connection attempts originating from mmc.exe or eventvwr.msc to external/untrusted hosts, which may indicate NTLM hash capture via malicious .msc Link to Web Address snap-in.
  • Flag XML files imported into Event Viewer that contain external DTD references (e.g., payload.dtd hosted on a remote server), as this is the two-stage XXE exfiltration technique used in the PoC.
  • Watch for the error message 'The specified custom view is not valid' in Event Viewer combined with outbound network connections, as the exploit succeeds silently from the attacker's perspective while the victim sees this error.
  • ·The XXE vulnerability is due to a misconfigured XML parser in the MMC custom view functionality — the parser processes external entities by default. The fix modifies XML parsing behavior in Event Viewer.
  • ·The vulnerability requires user interaction: an authenticated user must be convinced to import a malicious XML file via the 'Import Custom View' feature in Event Viewer.

CVSS provenance

nvdv3.14.7MEDIUMCVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
nvdv3.05.5MEDIUMCVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
nvdv2.04.3MEDIUMAV:N/AC:M/Au:N/C:P/I:N/A:N
vulncheck4.7MEDIUM
vendor_msrc4.7MEDIUM
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