CVE-2024-47148

Executive Summary

CVE-2024-47148 is a vulnerability affecting certain Honor products, characterized by incorrect privilege assignment. This flaw could allow a local attacker with low privileges to cause device service exceptions, potentially leading to denial of service or other unspecified impacts. The vulnerability has a CVSS score of 4.0 (Medium), with an EPSS score of 0.0%, indicating low exploitation likelihood in the wild. No public proof-of-concept, exploit code, or patch details are currently available. The vendor, Honor, has not yet released a security update.

Supply Chain & Package Security

This vulnerability is not related to any open-source package ecosystem (NPM, PyPI, Go, Ruby). It is a firmware-level issue in Honor's proprietary software.

CVSS Breakdown & Threat Level

• CVSS Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/A:L
• Base Score: 4.0 (Medium)
• Attack Vector (AV): Local (L) – The attacker must have physical or local network access to the device.
• Attack Complexity (AC): Low (L) – No special conditions are required.
• Privileges Required (PR): Low (L) – The attacker needs low-level privileges.
• User Interaction (UI): None (N) – No user action is needed.
• Scope (S): Unchanged (U) – The vulnerability does not affect other components.
• Confidentiality (C): None (N) – No data exposure.
• Integrity (I): None (N) – No data modification.
• Availability (A): Low (L) – Service exceptions may cause limited denial of service.

Threat Level: Medium. The local attack vector and low privileges required make it a concern for enterprise environments where attackers may have local access. However, the lack of public exploits and low EPSS score reduce immediate risk.

Deep Dive & Mechanics

The vulnerability stems from incorrect privilege assignment (CWE-266) in Honor's device firmware. This means that certain system services or processes are granted permissions that are too high for their intended function, or that privilege boundaries are not properly enforced. An attacker with low-level access (e.g., a standard user or a compromised app) can exploit this to trigger service exceptions, potentially crashing critical system services or causing the device to become unstable.

The exact affected components are not disclosed, but typical areas include:

• System daemons handling hardware interfaces.
• Background services managing device state.
• Privilege escalation paths in the Android-based OS.

The vulnerability does not allow data theft or modification, but it can disrupt device operation, making it a denial-of-service (DoS) risk.

Vulnerable vs. Patched Code

No patch is available, and no code snippets have been released. The vulnerable code likely involves improper permission checks in system service calls. A patched version would enforce correct privilege validation, ensuring that only authorized processes can invoke sensitive functions.

Hypothetical vulnerable code (pseudocode):

// Vulnerable: No privilege check
void handleServiceRequest(int requestType) {
    // Directly process request without checking caller's privileges
    processRequest(requestType);
}

Hypothetical patched code:

// Patched: Privilege check added
void handleServiceRequest(int requestType, int callerUid) {
    if (!isPrivileged(callerUid)) {
        return ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED;
    }
    processRequest(requestType);
}

Exploitation & Lab Setup

Red Team

No public exploit code exists. To simulate exploitation in a lab:

1. Environment: Honor device with vulnerable firmware (unknown version).
2. Prerequisites: Local shell access with low privileges (e.g., ADB shell as a non-root user).
3. Exploitation Steps:
   • Identify vulnerable service via fuzzing or reverse engineering.
   • Send crafted IPC messages or system calls to trigger the privilege assignment flaw.
   • Observe service crashes or exceptions.

Example command (hypothetical):

adb shell
# Attempt to trigger service exception
service call vulnerable_service 1

Blue Team

To detect exploitation attempts:

• Monitor system logs for unexpected service crashes or privilege escalation attempts.
• Use endpoint detection and response (EDR) tools to track anomalous process behavior.
• Restrict local access to Honor devices in sensitive environments.

Indicators of Compromise (IOCs)

• Log Entries: Repeated service crash logs in logcat or dmesg related to system services.
• Process Anomalies: Unexpected termination of critical system processes (e.g., system_server, surfaceflinger).
• File Changes: Unauthorized modifications to system permission files (e.g., /etc/permissions/).
• Network Traffic: No network-based IOCs due to local attack vector.

Detection Engineering

YARA Rule

rule CVE_2024_47148_Honor_Privilege_Assignment {
    meta:
        description = "Detects potential exploitation of CVE-2024-47148 via privilege assignment anomalies"
        author = "Valters IT"
        date = "2025-04-10"
        reference = "https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-47148"
    strings:
        $s1 = "incorrect privilege assignment" wide ascii
        $s2 = "service exception" wide ascii
        $s3 = "CVE-2024-47148" wide ascii
    condition:
        any of them
}

Sigma Rule

title: CVE-2024-47148 - Honor Device Service Exception
id: 12345678-1234-1234-1234-123456789abc
status: experimental
description: Detects service exceptions on Honor devices possibly due to CVE-2024-47148
author: Valters IT
date: 2025-04-10
references:
    - https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2024-47148
logsource:
    product: android
    service: logcat
detection:
    selection:
        - "ServiceException"
        - "privilege"
        - "CVE-2024-47148"
    condition: selection
falsepositives:
    - Legitimate service restarts
level: medium

Suricata Rule

alert ip any any -> any any (msg:"CVE-2024-47148 Honor Privilege Assignment Attempt"; content:"privilege"; content:"exception"; classtype:attempted-dos; sid:1000001; rev:1;)

Remediation & Mitigation

• Vendor Patch: Await an official firmware update from Honor. Check Honor's security advisory page regularly.
• Workarounds:
  • Restrict physical and local access to Honor devices.
  • Use device management policies to limit app installations and permissions.
  • Monitor device logs for unusual service behavior.
• Long-term: Implement least privilege principles in firmware development and conduct regular security audits.

Valters IT