CVE-2025-37101 is a high-severity vulnerability identified in Hewlett Packard Enterprise's HPE OneView for VMware vCenter (OV4VC) prior to version 11.7. The vulnerability stems from improper privilege management (CWE-269), allowing an attacker who initially has only read-only privileges to escalate their access vertically and perform administrative actions. This means that an operator with limited permissions can exploit this flaw to gain elevated privileges, potentially compromising the integrity and availability of the system. The CVSS 3.1 base score is 8.7, reflecting a high impact and relatively low attack complexity. The vector string (CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:R/S:C/C:N/I:H/A:H) indicates that the attack can be performed remotely over the network (AV:N) with low complexity (AC:L), requires the attacker to have some privileges (PR:L) and user interaction (UI:R), and affects a system where the scope is changed (S:C). The vulnerability does not impact confidentiality directly (C:N) but has a high impact on integrity (I:H) and availability (A:H). No known exploits are currently reported in the wild, and no patches have been linked yet, suggesting that the vendor may still be working on remediation or that the vulnerability was recently disclosed. The vulnerability affects all versions prior to 11.7, which implies that organizations running older versions are at risk. Given that HPE OneView for VMware vCenter is a management platform integrating HPE hardware management with VMware virtualization environments, exploitation could allow attackers to manipulate virtual infrastructure and hardware management, potentially disrupting critical IT operations.

For European organizations, the impact of this vulnerability can be significant, especially for enterprises and data centers relying on HPE OneView integrated with VMware vCenter for managing their virtualized infrastructure. Successful exploitation could allow attackers to perform unauthorized administrative actions, leading to manipulation or disruption of virtual machines, hardware resources, and management workflows. This could result in service outages, data integrity issues, and potential cascading failures in IT infrastructure. Industries such as finance, telecommunications, manufacturing, and public sector entities that depend heavily on virtualized environments and HPE hardware management are particularly at risk. The availability impact is high, potentially causing downtime of critical services. Although confidentiality is not directly impacted, the integrity and availability losses could indirectly affect data security and business continuity. The requirement for some privileges and user interaction reduces the likelihood of mass exploitation but does not eliminate risk in environments where multiple operators have read-only access or where social engineering could be used to trigger the exploit.

1. Immediate upgrade to HPE OneView for VMware vCenter version 11.7 or later once available to ensure the vulnerability is patched. 2. Restrict read-only privileges strictly to trusted personnel and audit all accounts with such access to minimize the attack surface. 3. Implement robust monitoring and alerting on administrative actions within OV4VC to detect unusual privilege escalations or configuration changes. 4. Employ network segmentation to limit access to the management interfaces of HPE OneView and VMware vCenter, reducing exposure to potential attackers. 5. Use multi-factor authentication (MFA) for all users accessing management consoles to mitigate risks from compromised credentials. 6. Conduct regular security training to raise awareness about social engineering risks that might facilitate user interaction required for exploitation. 7. Review and harden VMware and HPE OneView integration configurations to follow the principle of least privilege and disable unnecessary features or services. 8. Prepare incident response plans specifically addressing potential privilege escalation scenarios within virtualization management environments.