CVE-2022-20965: Cisco ISE Auth Bypass Vulnerability

CVE-2022-20965 Overview

CVE-2022-20965 is an improper access control vulnerability in the web-based management interface of Cisco Identity Services Engine (ISE). An authenticated, remote attacker can issue direct requests to features that should be restricted, bypassing application-level authorization checks. Successful exploitation allows the attacker to perform privileged actions within the management interface that should be otherwise unavailable to their account. The flaw is tracked under CWE-648: Incorrect Use of Privileged APIs and affects Cisco ISE releases 2.6, 2.7, 3.0, 3.1, and 3.2. Cisco published a security advisory tracked as cisco-sa-ise-7Q4TNYUx describing the impact and fixed releases.

Critical Impact

An authenticated low-privileged user on Cisco ISE can bypass authorization checks and execute privileged management actions, undermining administrative trust boundaries in the network access control plane.

Affected Products

• Cisco Identity Services Engine 2.6 (including all listed patches)
• Cisco Identity Services Engine 2.7 and 3.0 (including all listed patches)
• Cisco Identity Services Engine 3.1 and 3.2

Discovery Timeline

• 2023-01-20 - CVE-2022-20965 published to NVD
• 2024-11-21 - Last updated in NVD database

Technical Details for CVE-2022-20965

Vulnerability Analysis

The vulnerability resides in the web-based management interface of Cisco ISE. The interface enforces access control at the navigation and presentation layer rather than uniformly at the request handler. An authenticated user with limited privileges can craft direct HTTP requests to backend endpoints that perform privileged operations. Because the underlying handlers do not re-validate the caller's role, the request is processed as if it were issued by an authorized administrator. The flaw therefore exposes administrative functionality without requiring credential theft or privilege escalation through memory corruption.

Root Cause

The root cause is improper access control on selected features within the management interface, mapped to [CWE-648]. Authorization checks are applied inconsistently across protected functions. The application trusts that users will only reach privileged features through the rendered UI, rather than enforcing role-based authorization at every endpoint. This design assumption fails as soon as a user issues a direct request to the underlying URL.

Attack Vector

Exploitation requires network access to the ISE management interface and valid credentials for any account with web UI access. The attacker authenticates normally, then sends crafted HTTP requests directly to restricted endpoints, bypassing the UI-driven access flow. No user interaction by an administrator is required. Because Cisco ISE governs network access policy, RADIUS, TACACS+, and posture decisions, abuse of privileged actions can affect downstream authentication and authorization across the enterprise network.

No public proof-of-concept or exploit code is associated with this CVE, and it is not listed in the CISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog. See the Cisco Security Advisory cisco-sa-ise-7Q4TNYUx for vendor-provided technical detail.

Detection Methods for CVE-2022-20965

Indicators of Compromise

• Authenticated sessions from low-privilege ISE accounts issuing HTTP requests to administrative URLs that are normally accessed only by admin or super-admin roles.
• Unexpected configuration changes, policy modifications, or audit log entries attributed to non-administrative accounts on Cisco ISE.
• Repeated HTTP 200 responses to direct requests against management endpoints not referenced by the rendered UI for that user role.

Detection Strategies

• Review ISE administrative audit logs for actions performed by accounts whose assigned role should not include those operations.
• Correlate web access logs with role assignments to identify direct-request patterns that bypass the standard navigation flow.
• Baseline normal API and URL access patterns per administrative role, then alert on deviations.

Monitoring Recommendations

• Forward Cisco ISE administrative and operational logs to a centralized SIEM for retention and correlation.
• Restrict management interface reachability to a dedicated administrative network segment and monitor all inbound sessions.
• Enable and review change-tracking on ISE policy sets, authorization profiles, and identity store configurations.

How to Mitigate CVE-2022-20965

Immediate Actions Required

• Apply the fixed Cisco ISE release identified in advisory cisco-sa-ise-7Q4TNYUx for your installed train (2.6, 2.7, 3.0, 3.1, or 3.2).
• Audit all Cisco ISE web UI accounts and remove or downgrade any that are not required for daily operations.
• Rotate credentials for any administrative or operator account that may have been used by untrusted personnel.

Patch Information

Cisco has released software updates that address this vulnerability. Customers should consult the Cisco Security Advisory cisco-sa-ise-7Q4TNYUx for the specific fixed releases corresponding to each affected train and follow the documented upgrade path. There are no documented workarounds from the vendor; patching is the supported remediation.

Workarounds

• Restrict access to the ISE web management interface to a small set of trusted administrative hosts using ACLs or a jump-host architecture.
• Enforce least privilege on ISE administrative role assignments and disable unused operator accounts pending patch deployment.
• Require multi-factor authentication for all ISE administrative logins to raise the cost of credential abuse needed to reach this vulnerability.

# Example: restrict ISE admin interface reachability at the network edge
# (replace addresses with your administrative jump-host subnet)
ip access-list extended ISE-ADMIN-ACL
 permit tcp 10.10.50.0 0.0.0.255 host <ISE-MGMT-IP> eq 443
 deny   tcp any host <ISE-MGMT-IP> eq 443 log
 permit ip any any