VMware has issued a critical warning to administrators regarding a discontinued authentication plugin that poses severe security risks to Windows domain environments. The plugin, VMware Enhanced Authentication Plug-in (EAP), has been deprecated for nearly three years, yet two unpatched vulnerabilities expose systems to authentication relay and session hijack attacks. These vulnerabilities, tracked as CVE-2024-22245 and CVE-2024-22250, allow malicious actors to exploit Kerberos service tickets and take control of privileged EAP sessions, posing significant threats to system integrity.
The potential impact of these vulnerabilities is alarming, as attackers could manipulate domain users with EAP installed in their web browsers to request and relay service tickets for arbitrary Active Directory Service Principal Names (SPNs). Additionally, attackers with local access to a Windows operating system can hijack privileged EAP sessions initiated by other users on the same system. Despite the severity of these vulnerabilities, VMware has not detected any evidence of exploitation in the wild, but the company urges immediate action to mitigate the risks.
To secure vulnerable systems, administrators are advised to uninstall both the in-browser plugin/client and the associated Windows service. PowerShell commands are provided as a means to facilitate the removal process. Furthermore, VMware emphasizes that the deprecated EAP is not installed by default and is not part of essential VMware products, but manual installation on Windows workstations for administrative tasks poses a significant risk. As an alternative, VMware recommends employing other authentication methods such as Active Directory over LDAPS, Microsoft Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS), Okta, and Microsoft Entra ID to bolster security against potential threats.
