CVE-2017-5521
NETGEAR Multiple Devices Exposure of Sensitive Information Vulnerability
Does this matter?
Known to be exploited in the wild (CISA KEV, CISA remediation deadline 29 September 2022). Treat as an emergency change: patch or isolate now, then hunt for prior compromise.
Description
An issue was discovered on NETGEAR R8500, R8300, R7000, R6400, R7300, R7100LG, R6300v2, WNDR3400v3, WNR3500Lv2, R6250, R6700, R6900, and R8000 devices. They are prone to password disclosure via simple crafted requests to the web management server. The bug is exploitable remotely if the remote management option is set, and can also be exploited given access to the router over LAN or WLAN. When trying to access the web panel, a user is asked to authenticate; if the authentication is canceled and password recovery is not enabled, the user is redirected to a page that exposes a password recovery token. If a user supplies the correct token to the page /passwordrecovered.cgi?id=TOKEN (and password recovery is not enabled), they will receive the admin password for the router. If password recovery is set the exploit will fail, as it will ask the user for the recovery questions that were previously set when enabling that feature. This is persistent (even after disabling the recovery option, the exploit will fail) because the router will ask for the security questions.
- CVSS 3.1
- 8.1 HIGHCVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:H/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
- EPSS
- 89.35% probability · 100th percentile
- Public exploits
- 1 in Exploit-DB · verified · first 30 January 2017
- CISA KEV
- Listed 8 September 2022 · due 29 September 2022
- Affected
- netgear/r6200 firmware · netgear/r6300 firmware · netgear/vegn2610 firmware · netgear/ac1450 firmware · netgear/wnr1000v3 firmware · netgear/wndr3700v3 firmware · netgear/wndr4000 firmware · netgear/wndr4500 firmware · netgear/d6400 firmware · netgear/d6220 firmware · netgear/d6300 firmware · netgear/d6300b firmware · netgear/dgn2200bv4 firmware
- Source
- cve@mitre.org
EPSS 89.4% since 27 October 2026; no change recorded yet. The dashed line is the ten per cent mark our analysts treat as “patch before the next change window”. Points are recorded when the score first appears and whenever it moves by a percentage point or more.
CISA notes
Apply updates per vendor instructions. If the affected device has since entered end-of-life, it should be disconnected if still in use. https://kb.netgear.com/30632/Web-GUI-Password-Recovery-and-Exposure-Security-Vulnerability; https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2017-5521
Public exploits (1)
Entries in Exploit-DB that cite this CVE. Links go to the Exploit-DB page and to the file in the public repository; nothing is hosted here. A verified tick means the Exploit-DB team confirmed the exploit works against the stated version.
References
- http://kb.netgear.com/30632/Web-GUI-Password-Recovery-and-Exposure-Security-VulnerabilityVendor Advisory
- http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/95457Broken Link, Third Party Advisory, VDB Entry
- https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/41205/Exploit, Third Party Advisory, VDB Entry
- http://kb.netgear.com/30632/Web-GUI-Password-Recovery-and-Exposure-Security-VulnerabilityVendor Advisory
- http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/95457Broken Link, Third Party Advisory, VDB Entry
- https://www.exploit-db.com/exploits/41205/Exploit, Third Party Advisory, VDB Entry
- https://www.cisa.gov/known-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog?field_cve=CVE-2017-5521US Government Resource
Source: NVD record, EPSS from FIRST.org, KEV from CISA, exploits from Exploit-DB. Refreshed daily. Download this record as JSON.