PAN-OS: Use of a Weak Cryptographic Algorithm for Stored Password Hashes

Description

Usage of a weak cryptographic algorithm in Palo Alto Networks PAN-OS software where the password hashes of administrator and local user accounts are not created with a sufficient level of computational effort, which allows for password cracking attacks on accounts in normal (non-FIPS-CC) operational mode. An attacker must have access to the account password hashes to take advantage of this weakness and can acquire those hashes if they are able to gain access to the PAN-OS software configuration. Fixed versions of PAN-OS software use a secure cryptographic algorithm for account password hashes. This issue does not impact Prisma Access firewalls. This issue impacts: PAN-OS 8.1 versions earlier than PAN-OS 8.1.21; All versions of PAN-OS 9.0; PAN-OS 9.1 versions earlier than PAN-OS 9.1.11; PAN-OS 10.0 versions earlier than PAN-OS 10.0.7.

Scores

EPSS (exploitation in 30 days)

0.13% · top 98% of all CVEs (6 Nov 2026)

The list uses the assigner's score when there is one, then CISA's, then NVD's: Medium 4.1.

Weakness

• CWE-916 Use of Password Hash With Insufficient Computational Effort (opens in a new tab)All about CWE-916 and its CVEs

Affected products

• Palo Alto Networks · PAN-OS

  • unaffected 10.1.*
  • affected 9.0.*
  • unaffected 10.2.*
  • affected 9.1 – < 9.1.11
  • affected 8.1 – < 8.1.21
  • affected 10.0 – < 10.0.7

• Palo Alto Networks · Prisma Access

  • unaffected 3.0 Preferred, Innovation
  • unaffected 2.2 Preferred
  • unaffected 2.1 Preferred, Innovation

What to do

Solution: This issue is fixed in PAN-OS 8.1.21, PAN-OS 9.1.11, PAN-OS 10.0.7, and all later PAN-OS versions. The passwords for all existing local user and administrator accounts must be changed after PAN-OS is upgraded to a fixed version to leverage the more secure cryptography for password hashes. You cannot update existing password hashes. All new local user and administrator accounts will use secure cryptography. PAN-OS 9.0 is end-of-life as of March 1, 2022, and is no longer covered by our Product Security Assurance policies.

Workaround: Ensure that any exported firewall configuration files are secured and that only trusted users have firewall management access to prevent the exposure of password hashes. Using complex and secure passwords for all administrator and local user accounts makes password cracking infeasible and mitigates the impact of this issue. Switching PAN-OS software from normal mode to FIPS-CC mode ensures that appliances use secure cryptography to store hashed credentials for all local user accounts. However, when you enable FIPS-CC mode, the appliance will reset to the factory default settings and the existing configuration is removed. Documentation to enable FIPS-CC mode is available here: https://docs.paloaltonetworks.com/pan-os/10-2/pan-os-admin/certifications/enable-fips-and-common-criteria-support.html

Exploitation: Palo Alto Networks is not aware of any malicious exploitation of this issue.

References (1)

• https://security.paloaltonetworks.com/CVE-2022-0022 (opens in a new tab)x_refsource_MISCx_transferred

Sources

The same CVE in the primary databases and aggregators, to check against.

• CVE.org record (opens in a new tab)
• CVE List JSON (GitHub) (opens in a new tab)
• NVD (opens in a new tab)
• FIRST EPSS (opens in a new tab)
• OSV.dev (opens in a new tab)
• GitHub Advisories (opens in a new tab)
• CIRCL Vulnerability-Lookup (opens in a new tab)

Badge for a README or a ticket

[![CVE-2022-0022](https://trackcve.app/badge/CVE-2022-0022.svg)](https://trackcve.app/cve/CVE-2022-0022)

Record last updated 16 Sept 2024, 20:47 UTC.