EUVD-2026-62428
GHSA-pm34-h6p9-7p29
Severity by source
AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:N
TLS certificate impersonation requires network positioning (AC:H); no prior credentials are needed to exploit the certificate validation failure (PR:N); availability is unaffected.
Primary rating from Vendor (ibm).
CVSS VectorVendor: ibm
Lifecycle Timeline
2DescriptionCVE.org
IBM AIX 7.2, and 7.3 and IBM PowerVM VIOS 4.1 NIM could allow a remote attacker to gain unauthorized access to AIX systems due to improper validation of TLS certificates.
AnalysisAI
Improper TLS certificate validation in the NIM (Network Installation Management) subsystem of IBM AIX 7.2, 7.3, and IBM PowerVM VIOS 4.1 enables remote attackers to gain unauthorized access to AIX systems by exploiting the failure to verify certificate authenticity during NIM communications. The CVSS 8.1 High score reflects high confidentiality and integrity impact across a network-exploitable path with low complexity and no user interaction required. No public exploit identified at time of analysis, but the authentication bypass classification of this flaw makes it a meaningful privilege escalation and lateral movement risk in IBM Power environments.
Technical ContextAI
NIM (Network Installation Management) is IBM AIX's built-in infrastructure for managing software installation, maintenance, and configuration across AIX client systems over the network, communicating over TLS-secured channels between a NIM master and NIM clients. CWE-295 (Improper Certificate Validation) identifies the root cause: the NIM component does not adequately verify the authenticity or integrity of TLS certificates presented during these sessions, creating an opportunity for certificate impersonation or man-in-the-middle interception of NIM traffic. Affected CPEs are cpe:2.3:a:ibm:aix and cpe:2.3:a:ibm:powervm_vios, covering AIX 7.2, 7.3, and PowerVM VIOS 4.1. VIOS (Virtual I/O Server) is a specialized AIX-based partition that provides virtualized I/O resources to logical partitions on IBM Power hardware, meaning this vulnerability is relevant to both bare-metal AIX deployments and virtualized IBM Power infrastructure, potentially widening the blast radius to other co-hosted logical partitions dependent on VIOS.
RemediationAI
A vendor-released patch is confirmed available per IBM's advisory at https://www.ibm.com/support/pages/node/7283858; administrators running IBM AIX 7.2, 7.3, or PowerVM VIOS 4.1 should consult that page immediately to identify the applicable fix package and apply it. Exact patched version identifiers are not available in the supplied intelligence and must be sourced from the IBM advisory directly. As a compensating control pending patching, restrict NIM master-to-client and client-to-master network traffic to a dedicated, isolated management VLAN and enforce host-based or network-layer access controls (firewall ACLs) that prevent untrusted hosts from initiating or intercepting connections on NIM service ports. Additionally, consider disabling NIM services entirely on systems that do not actively require software installation or maintenance operations to eliminate the attack surface. Network segmentation reduces exposure significantly but does not remediate the underlying certificate validation flaw and should not be treated as a permanent substitute for the vendor patch.
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Same weakness CWE-295 – Improper Certificate Validation
View allSame technique Authentication Bypass
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External POC / Exploit Code
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