Vulnerability in Siemens SIMATIC S7-300 CPUs (CVE-2018-16561)
Summary
Vulnerability in Siemens SIMATIC S7-300 CPUs (CVE-2018-16561). Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure.
Original description
The description as published by the source.
A vulnerability has been identified in SIMATIC S7-300 CPUs (All versions < V3.X.16). The affected CPUs improperly validate S7 communication packets which could cause a Denial-of-Service condition of the CPU. The CPU will remain in DEFECT mode until manual restart. Successful exploitation requires an attacker to be able to send a specially crafted S7 communication packet to a communication interface of the CPU. This includes Ethernet, PROFIBUS, and Multi Point Interfaces (MPI). No user interaction or privileges are required to exploit the security vulnerability. The vulnerability could allow causing a Denial-of-Service condition of the core functionality of the CPU, compromising the availability of the system. At the time of advisory publication no public exploitation of this security vulnerability was known. Siemens confirms the security vulnerability and provides mitigations to resolve the security issue.
Source: NIST National Vulnerability Database NVD GitHub Advisory
Auto-generated summary
Assembled by SecPulse from the source data (CVSS, CWE, affected versions) using templates — no AI involved. Check the original description and references below for exact details.
A vulnerability tracked as CVE-2018-16561 has been found in Siemens SIMATIC S7-300 CPUs.
Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure. CVSS score: 7.5/10.
What to do: apply the vendor's official patched release.
If unsure, ask your IT team or search "Siemens SIMATIC S7-300 CPUs CVE-2018-16561" on the vendor's site.
CVE-2018-16561 (Siemens SIMATIC S7-300 CPUs) — CWE-20 / CVSS v3 7.5
Attack vector: remote (network-reachable) / unauthenticated / no user interaction
Plan: 1) Audit SBOM/dependencies, 2) Stage→prod upgrade, 3) Add WAF/proxy monitoring on affected endpoints, 4) Hunt IOCs in logs.
Refs: see the GHSA / vendor advisory / patched release linked on this page.
A vulnerability (CWE-20) exists in Siemens SIMATIC S7-300 CPUs.
Check the vendor advisory for the affected versions of Siemens SIMATIC S7-300 CPUs.
Severity: High (CVSS 7.5/10). Risk of unauthorized operations or information disclosure.
Update to the patched release per vendor advisory.
Until the patch is applied: disable the affected feature, apply WAF rules, or restrict access via network ACLs.
Search webserver/proxy logs for unusual request patterns matching this CVE's known IOCs. Audit SBOM/dependencies to find affected services.
Response actions
Concrete steps and command examples for SOC/SRE teams to execute in order
-
1Identify exposure identify
Audit SBOM/dependencies for affected components.資産台帳・SBOM・依存マニフェストで Siemens SIMATIC S7-300 CPUs を使っているサービスとバージョンを洗い出す。
-
2Post-deployment verification verify
Confirm patched version is live in productionパッチ適用後、ステージングで PoC または同等の悪用パターンを再現して脆弱性が閉じたことを確認。本番ではアクセスログ・WAF でアラート再発が無いか継続監視。
References
- web cert-portal.siemens.com
- web nvd.nist.gov
- web github.com