Security Bulletin: IBM Cloud Pak for Multicloud Management has applied security fixes for its use of Log4j for CVE-2021-44228

Summary

IBM Cloud Pak for Multicloud Management has applied security fixes for its use of Log4j for CVE-2021-44228. Log4j is used by various microservices either directly or indirectly through dependent open source software for logging messages to files.

Vulnerability Details

CVEID:CVE-2021-44228
**DESCRIPTION:**Apache Log4j could allow a remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on the system, caused by the failure to protect against attacker controlled LDAP and other JNDI related endpoints by JNDI features. By sending a specially crafted code string, an attacker could exploit this vulnerability to load arbitrary Java code on the server and take complete control of the system. Note: The vulnerability is also called Log4Shell or LogJam.
CVSS Base score: 10
CVSS Temporal Score: See: https://exchange.xforce.ibmcloud.com/vulnerabilities/214921 for the current score.
CVSS Vector: (CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:H)

Affected Products and Versions

Remediation/Fixes

Upgrade to IBM Cloud Pak for Multicloud Management 2.3 Fix Pack 3 by following the instructions at <https://ibm.biz/upgrade_fixpack&gt;.

Note:

- The Apache Log4j open source library is used by Elasticsearch for logging messages to files. The recommended solution involves two images of IBM Cloud Pak for Multicloud Management: icp-elasticsearch-oss. This image has been updated to use Elasticsearch 6.8.21 in IBM Cloud Pak for Multicloud Management 2.3 Fix Pack 3. For details about Elasticsearch announcement (ESA-2021-31), see <https://discuss.elastic.co/t/apache-log4j2-remote-code-execution-rce-vulnerability-cve-2021-44228-esa-2021-31/291476&gt;

- Where the log4j package could not be updated at this time, this 2.3 Fix Pack3 release mitigates the vulnerability by setting the JVM option 3.4k -Dlog4j2.formatMsgNoLookups=true and removing the vulnerable JndiLookup class from the Log4j package. Some vulnerability scanners might continue to flag Elasticsearch in association with this vulnerability based on the Log4j version alone. However, the mitigations sufficiently protect both remote code execution and information leakage.

Workarounds and Mitigations

IBM recommends clients should configure their firewalls to block unauthorized outbound connections to mitigate against this and similar vulnerabilities.