VulnerabilityPublished 14 Aug 2025

CVE-2025-20218: Cisco Firepower Management Center · XPath Injection

Affects Cisco Firepower Management CenterSource CVE Database V5

Not known to be exploited · CVSS 4.9 Medium.

Data as of 26 Oct 2026, 17:16 UTC

CVSS 3.1 base score

4.9Medium

How severe the flaw is on the 0–10 CVSS scale.

EPSS: 0.4% chance of exploitation in 30 days – higher than 38% of CVEsExploit Prediction Scoring System: the likelihood attackers will use this flaw soon.

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N

Attack Vector: Network
Attack Complexity: Low
Privileges Required: High
User Interaction: None
Scope: Unchanged
Confidentiality: High
Integrity: None
Availability: None

Bold values are the worst case: easiest to exploit or largest impact.

Attack Vector: Network: The vulnerable component is bound to the network stack and the set of possible attackers extends beyond the other options listed, up to and including the entire Internet. Such a vulnerability is often termed 'remotely exploitable' and can be thought of as an attack being exploitable at the protocol level one or more network hops away (e.g., across one or more routers).
Attack Complexity: Low: Specialized access conditions or extenuating circumstances do not exist. An attacker can expect repeatable success against the vulnerable component.
Privileges Required: High: The attacker is authorized with (i.e., requires) privileges that provide significant (e.g., administrative) control over the vulnerable component that could affect component-wide settings and files.
User Interaction: None: The vulnerable system can be exploited without any interaction from any user.
Scope: Unchanged: An exploited vulnerability can only affect resources managed by the same security authority. In this case, the vulnerable component and the impacted component are either the same, or both are managed by the same security authority.
Confidentiality: High: There is total loss of confidentiality, resulting in all resources within the impacted component being divulged to the attacker. Alternatively, access to only some restricted information is obtained, but the disclosed information presents a direct, serious impact.
Integrity: None: There is no loss of integrity within the impacted component.
Availability: None: There is no impact to availability within the impacted component.

Definitions: FIRST CVSS v3.1 specification.

Exploitation evidence

Disclosed: evidence found.
CVE published 14 Aug 2025
Detectable: no evidence on record.
No public nuclei template indexed
Weaponised: no evidence on record.
No public exploit code indexed in Metasploit or Exploit-DB
Exploited in the wildExploited: no evidence on record.
Not in CISA KEV and no source reports exploitation
Observed by OffSeq MirageSeen by Mirage: no evidence on record.
No attack traffic recorded by OffSeq Mirage sensors

A missing step is not evidence of safety. Sources: cve.org (opens in a new tab), the Metasploit, Exploit-DB and nuclei-templates index as of 26 Oct 2026.

Disclosed: The CVE record is public on cve.org. Its publication is t = 0.
Detectable: A public nuclei template can find exposed instances, for defenders and attackers alike.
Weaponised: Public exploit code exists in Metasploit or Exploit-DB, or CISA SSVC or the CVSS exploit maturity reports a public proof of concept.
Exploited in the wild: CISA KEV lists it, CISA SSVC rates exploitation active, or a source reports attacks.
Observed by OffSeq Mirage: OffSeq Mirage honeypot sensors recorded attack traffic for this CVE, or found exposed hosts without attack traffic.

Moments are spaced evenly, not to scale; a dashed line marks a gap of six months or more. Deltas count from t = 0. Sources that give only a date (CISA KEV, Exploit-DB, or a time of exactly 00:00Z) read “same day” rather than hours. Metasploit modules carry the flaw’s disclosure date, not their release date, and nuclei templates carry no date, so both appear above but not on the timeline.

What to do

Affected software

Product	Affected	Fixed in
Cisco Cisco Firepower Management Center	Affected 6.2.3 – 7.4.2.1 87 affected builds	Fixed in–

AI-suggested

To mitigate this vulnerability, European organizations should: 1) Immediately verify and restrict administrative access to Cisco FMC, ensuring only trusted personnel have credentials and employing strong authentication mechanisms such as multi-factor authentication (MFA). 3) Conduct thorough input validation and sanitization on any custom integrations or scripts interacting with FMC’s web interface to prevent injection attacks. 4) Implement strict network segmentation and access controls to limit exposure of the FMC management interface to only necessary administrative networks. 5) Regularly audit administrative account usage and monitor logs for suspicious activity indicative of attempted injection or unauthorized data access. 6) Consider deploying additional monitoring tools to detect anomalous XPath queries or unusual FMC interface requests. 7) Educate administrators about the risks of credential compromise and enforce strong password policies. These targeted steps go beyond generic advice by focusing on access control, monitoring, and proactive patch management tailored to the nature of this XPath injection vulnerability.

Description

A vulnerability in the web-based management interface of Cisco Secure Firewall Management Center (FMC) Software could allow an authenticated, remote attacker to retrieve sensitive information from an affected device. This vulnerability is due to insufficient input validation. An attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending a crafted request to the web-based management interface of an affected device. A successful exploit could allow the attacker to retrieve sensitive information from the affected device. To exploit this vulnerability, the attacker must have valid administrative credentials.

Impact

For European organizations, this vulnerability poses a risk primarily to the confidentiality of sensitive network security data managed by Cisco FMC. Since FMC is widely used to centrally manage firewall policies, intrusion prevention, and network traffic monitoring, unauthorized disclosure of configuration details, security policies, or network topology could aid attackers in planning further intrusions or evading detection. The requirement for administrative credentials limits the attack surface to insiders or attackers who have already compromised privileged accounts, but the impact remains critical in environments where FMC holds sensitive operational data. Exposure of such data could lead to targeted attacks, compliance violations (e.g., GDPR concerns over data protection), and erosion of trust in network security infrastructure. The vulnerability does not directly affect system availability or integrity, but the confidentiality breach could indirectly facilitate more damaging attacks. European organizations with critical infrastructure, financial services, telecommunications, and government sectors relying on Cisco FMC are especially at risk due to the sensitive nature of their network environments and regulatory scrutiny.

References

sec.cloudapps.cisco.com/security/center/content/CiscoSecurityAdvisory/cisco-sa-fmc-xpathinj-COrThdMb (opens in a new tab)

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Exploitation evidence

What to do

Affected software

Description

AI analysisMachine-generated, updated 14 Aug 2025, 17:23 UTC

Technical details

References

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