Protecting Intelligent Platform Management Interface (IPMI) devices

Posted:  May 14th, 2018

 

Critical Supermicro IPMI BMC vulnerabilities were published in early 2014. Vulnerable IPMI devices accessible publicly from the Internet represent a high risk for businesses. A hacker or an unauthorized person can access an IPMI device's console and do what they wants (reboot your server, reinstall it, change the configuration).

 

Resolution:

 

In order to secure your IPMI and your IT infrastructure, please apply the following solutions:

 

1) Disconnect the IPMI device from the Internet (If you do not need it at all).

 

2) Have the IPMI devices accessible only via VPN (or from the internal network using private IP addresses).

 

If you have to keep your IPMI accessible publicly, these are some of the security measures to take:

 

    > Implement the IPMI security best practices (Enable IP address control, Manage your users, ...) via your IPMI web interface.

 

    > Replace the ADMIN/admin default administrator user with a new administrator user.

 

    > Delete any users that are no longer active, and disable the default users when possible.

 

    > Keep your IPMI software and firmware up-to-date and reset ALL the IPMI accounts passwords.

 

    > Implement the best practices to secure the IPMI devices available here (PDF): http://fish2.com/ipmi/bp.pdf

 

References:

 

http://blog.cari.net/carisirt-yet-another-bmc-vulnerability-and-some-added-extras/

http://fish2.com/ipmi/

http://fish2.com/ipmi/river.pdf

http://www.supermicro.com/products/nfo/files/IPMI/CVE_Update.pdf

http://threatpost.com/seven-ipmi-firmware-zero-days-disclosed

http://fish2.com/ipmi/remote-pw-cracking.html

https://community.rapid7.com/community/metasploit/blog/2013/07/02/a-penetration-testers-guide-to-ipmi

http://blog.cdw.com/ipmi-vulnerabilities-dont-panic-but-do-take-action/#.U58j3y_olhE

http://www.cisco.com/web/about/security/intelligence/IPMI_security.html