Software developers and electronics enthusiasts rely heavily on Visual Studio Code (VSCode) in combination with the Arduino extension to simplify the development process for their Arduino projects. Unfortunately, a recently discovered vulnerability (CVE-2024-43488) within this extension has been found to allow an unauthenticated attacker to execute arbitrary code remotely on the victim's machine. This blog post details the vulnerability, how it can be exploited, and the necessary steps required to mitigate this risk.

Vulnerability Details

The critical function within the VSCode Arduino extension – identified as CVE-2024-43488 – is missing authentication, allowing an attacker to trigger remote code execution (RCE) on the victim's machine remotely. Due to the lack of necessary authentication checks within the extension for critical functions, an attacker having access to the local network can exploit these vulnerabilities with relative ease.

To exploit this vulnerability, the attacker can send specifically crafted requests to the network listener, leading to remote command execution. The following code snippet shows an example of such a request:

import requests

target_url = "http://192.168..100:500/arduino_endpoint";
command_to_run = "calc.exe"

payload = {
    "cmd": command_to_run
}

response = requests.post(target_url, json=payload)
print(response.text)

In this example, the attacker's machine sends a request to the target victim's VSCode Arduino extension exposed on the local network. The payload contains a command – in this case, "calc.exe" – to be executed on the victim's machine. Once the request is successfully sent and processed, the command is executed on the victim's system without requiring any type of authentication or user interaction.

- [Original vulnerability report] (https://vulnerability-details-example.com/CVE-2024-43488)
- [GitHub repository with proof-of-concept exploit code] (https://github.com/example/CVE-2024-43488-Exploit)

Mitigation Steps

To protect your system against this vulnerability, it is essential to apply the appropriate updates to the VSCode Arduino extension. The developers of the extension have released a patched version that addresses the missing authentication issue, preventing potential attackers from exploiting this vulnerability insecure installations.

Conclusion

The discovery of the CVE-2024-43488 vulnerability in the Visual Studio Code extension for Arduino is a grave reminder of the importance of securing all aspects of the software development life cycle, including third-party tools and extensions. By keeping your software up-to-date and applying necessary patches, as well as adhering to secure coding practices, you can significantly reduce the risk of falling victim to such remote code execution attacks.

Timeline

Published on: 10/08/2024 18:15:11 UTC
Last modified on: 12/10/2024 18:46:32 UTC