Metabase has warned that a maximum-severity security flaw impacting its business intelligence and data visualization software package has been exploited in the wild as a zero-day.
The vulnerability (CVSS score: 10.0), which does not carry a CVE identifier, allows an unauthenticated remote attacker to inject arbitrary SQL into the Metabase application database, enabling them to gain administrator access to the instance.
Armed with the elevated access, the attacker can change the application configuration, steal stored credentials for the connected databases, read any data accessible through those connections, and export data.
“We recently identified that Metabase Cloud was attacked by someone utilizing an unknown (‘0-day’) security vulnerability in versions 1.58 and above,” Metabase said in an advisory.
Metabase Cloud instances have already been updated to the latest version. Users running self-hosted versions are advised to apply security patches released by Metabase with immediate effect. The following versions are affected –
- >= x.58.0, < x.58.23 (Fixed in x.58.24)
- >= x.59.0, < x.59.20 (Fixed in x.59.21)
- >= x.60.0, < x.60.16 (Fixed in x.60.17)
- >= x.61.0, < x.61.10 (Fixed in x.61.11)
- >= x.62.0, < x.62.8 (Fixed in x.62.9)
- >= x.63.0, < x.63.3 (Fixed in x.63.5)
As a temporary workaround until the fixes can be applied, it’s advised to block the “/api/session/reset_password” endpoint. Once the update is complete, customers who have their “/api/session/reset_password” endpoint publicly accessible are advised to perform the following steps –
- Revoke all active user sessions by accessing the Metabase Application Database and deleting all rows in the core_session table
- Review API keys and delete any unrecognized keys
- Review administrator accounts for any unexpected changes
- Rotate credentials for any of the connected databases
- Review data warehouse logs for any sign of unauthorized access
- Review Metabase activity and query history for unexpected or unauthorized activity
Metabase has not shared any specifics about the malicious activity, but shared the following indicators of compromise (IoCs) –
- A call to “POST /api/session/reset_password” with a 400 status code
- This is followed by a call to “GET /api/user/current” with a 200 status code
“If you find that pattern in your application logs or in your Metabase server ingress logs, it is likely that your instance has been compromised,” Metabase CEO Sameer Al-Sakran said.
One of the companies that has been affected is Framework. According to Engadget, the PC maker alerted all its customers that customer names, login IPs, addresses, phone numbers, and emails were accessed during the hack. It noted that no order or payment information was accessed.
Exactly three years ago, Metabase moved to address another “extremely severe” flaw (CVE-2023-38646, CVSS score: 9.8) that could have resulted in pre-authenticated remote code execution on affected installations.
