Insider Threat Management Windows Agent Local Privilege Escalation Vulnerability

Insider Threat Management Windows Agent Local Privilege Escalation Vulnerability, CVE-2021-22159

Advisory ID: PFPT-SA-2021-0001

The Proofpoint Insider Threat Management (formerly ObserveIT) Agent for Windows is missing authentication for a critical function, which allows a local authenticated Windows user to run arbitrary commands with the privileges of the Windows SYSTEM user. All versions before 7.4.3, 7.5.4, 7.6.5, 7.7.5, 7.8.4, 7.9.3, 7.10.2, and 7.11.0.25 are affected as well as versions 7.3 and earlier. Agents for MacOS, Linux, and ITM Cloud are not affected.

Vulnerability Information

This vulnerability is identified by CVE-2021-22159. Proofpoint has released patches to address this issue.

This vulnerability has been assigned a CVSS score of 7.8:

CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H

Fixed Software

Proofpoint has released fixed software versions 7.4.3, 7.5.4, 7.6.5, 7.7.5, 7.8.4, 7.9.3, 7.10.2, and 7.11.0.25.

The fixed software versions are now available through the customer support portal.

Acknowledgments

Thanks to Ruslan Sayfiev and Denis Faiustov of Ierae Security who helped us identify this vulnerability.

URL

https://www.proofpoint.com/us/security/security-advisories/pfpt-sa-2021-0001

Revision History

Version Description Section Date
1.0 Initial release   January 26, 2021
1.1 Add acknowledgments   March 22, 2022

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