SearchBlox Vulnerabilities Underscore the Importance of Updating Enterprise Search Tools

Consumers are constantly looking things up on Google, but within the enterprise, search tools can be essential to meeting customer needs and getting work done. Because of this, the discovery of several SearchBlox vulnerabilities could be a scary reminder that chief information security officers (CISOs) should worry about protecting corporate databases as well as the technology that is used to hunt through them.

An advisory from the Carnegie Mellon Software Engineering Institute CERT Division provided a detailed breakdown of the SearchBlox vulnerabilities, which the company says have now been patched. They ranged from holes that would allow cross-site scripting (XSS) and cross-site request forgery attacks to ways cybercriminals could upload files or view confidential information.

According to Ashish Kamble, the researcher who found the SearchBlox vulnerabilities, one of the problems around unrestricted file uploads stemmed from issues that were identified in 2013 but were not completely fixed. In a post on the Qualys blog, he said the flaws were in Version 8.1 of the product and have been fixed in Version 8.2 after he contacted the company.

Of all the possible threats, the ability for cybercriminals to conduct XSS attacks from within the product’s default search box is likely the most concerning, Threatpost reported. On the other hand, anyone trying to take advantage of such SearchBlox vulnerabilities would need to be an authenticated user, though there is no shortage of stories about insider threats within the enterprise.

Most consumers have probably never heard of SearchBlox, but it has quickly become a popular tool among corporate users who need to quickly scour customer relationship management systems, back-end portals, e-commerce sites and other repositories. According to a story on SecurityWeek, its user base spans 30 countries and more than 300 organizations. That means it could become an equally popular target for cybercriminals if users don’t quickly upgrade to the most recent version.

For all the talk about big data in the media, most organizations are probably most concerned about the structured information that runs day-to-day operations. That means if other SearchBlox vulnerabilities are discovered or rear their head in similar products, CISOs and their teams will certainly know where their priorities lie.

Shane Schick

Writer & Editor

NIST’s role in the global tech race against AI

4 min read - Last year, the United States Secretary of Commerce announced that the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has been put in charge of launching a new public working group on artificial intelligence (AI) that will build on the success of the NIST AI Risk Management Framework to address this rapidly advancing technology.However, recent budget cuts at NIST, along with a lack of strategy implementation, have called into question the agency’s ability to lead this critical effort. Ultimately, the success…

Researchers develop malicious AI ‘worm’ targeting generative AI systems

2 min read - Researchers have created a new, never-seen-before kind of malware they call the "Morris II" worm, which uses popular AI services to spread itself, infect new systems and steal data. The name references the original Morris computer worm that wreaked havoc on the internet in 1988.The worm demonstrates the potential dangers of AI security threats and creates a new urgency around securing AI models.New worm utilizes adversarial self-replicating promptThe researchers from Cornell Tech, the Israel Institute of Technology and Intuit, used what’s…

Passwords, passkeys and familiarity bias

5 min read - As passkey (passwordless authentication) adoption proceeds, misconceptions abound. There appears to be a widespread impression that passkeys may be more convenient and less secure than passwords. The reality is that they are both more secure and more convenient — possibly a first in cybersecurity.Most of us could be forgiven for not realizing passwordless authentication is more secure than passwords. Thinking back to the first couple of use cases I was exposed to — a phone operating system (OS) and a…

Security Intelligence

{{title}}

{{title}}

{{title}}

Topics

More from

NIST’s role in the global tech race against AI

Researchers develop malicious AI ‘worm’ targeting generative AI systems

Passwords, passkeys and familiarity bias

Topic updates