CriticalCVE-2022-27593

    DeadBolt Ransomware (CVE-2022-27593)

    Published In CISA KEV since Sources: CVE.org

    What is affected, what to do

    An externally controlled reference to a resource vulnerability has been reported to affect QNAP NAS running Photo Station. If exploited, This could allow an attacker to modify system files.

    The vulnerability is being actively exploited; treat it as a priority. CISA lists it as used in ransomware campaigns. Update QNAP Systems Photo Station to version 6.1.2, QNAP Systems Photo Station to version 6.0.22, QNAP Systems Photo Station to version 5.7.18. Immediate actions, mitigation and detection rules are in the runbook below.

    Affected
    • QNAP Systems Photo Station lt *..6.1.2
    • QNAP Systems Photo Station lt *..6.0.22
    • QNAP Systems Photo Station lt *..5.7.18
    • QNAP Systems Photo Station lt *..5.4.15
    • QNAP Systems Photo Station lt *..5.2.14
    Fixed in
    • QNAP Systems Photo Station 6.1.2
    • QNAP Systems Photo Station 6.0.22
    • QNAP Systems Photo Station 5.7.18
    • QNAP Systems Photo Station 5.4.15
    • QNAP Systems Photo Station 5.2.14

    Not sure whether and how you are affected? Ask a question about this vulnerability

    Metrics

    10.0

    Priority

    XIEM Effective CVSS: highest available CVSS rating from NVD and vendor data.

    Source: Vendor (CNA), CVSS v3

    10.0

    CVSS v3

    Severity Critical on the scale from 0 to 10.

    Source: CVE.org

    87.9 %

    EPSS score

    High — model estimates ≥ 50% chance of real-world exploitation within 30 days.

    Source: FIRST EPSS, percentile 99.76

    Show all metrics
    Severity
    Critical
    Priority (0–325)

    The priority score is a consolidated metric that condenses several individual signals into a single, action-guiding ranking: technical severity (CVSS), exploitation likelihood (EPSS), known-exploited status (KEV) and the context of the affected asset. The aim is to answer the only truly important question in vulnerability management: what first?

    Read in glossary
    256.00 Methodology
    Exploit maturity

    An exploit is code or a technique that specifically uses a concrete vulnerability to force unintended behaviour — such as executing code or escalating privileges. It is the tool that turns a theoretical flaw into a practical attack.

    Read in glossary
    actively exploited
    XIEM Effective CVSS

    XIEM® is the tiered managed-security operating model from NEOSEC and a registered trademark of NEOSEC GmbH. It extends classic SIEM — the central collection, normalisation and correlation of security-relevant events — with endpoint forensics, network visibility and deception technology, and consolidates them into three building tiers: Sentry, Orchestrate and Command.

    Read in glossary
    10.0 Methodology
    CVSS v3

    CVSS is the globally established, open standard for assessing the technical severity of a vulnerability on a scale from 0 to 10. It describes how easily a flaw can be exploited and what damage it can cause — but not how likely its actual exploitation is. CVSS and the complementary EPSS deliberately answer different questions.

    Read in glossary
    10.0
    EPSS score

    The EPSS score is the absolute model output for an individual vulnerability: the estimated probability of real-world exploitation within the next 30 days, expressed as a value between 0 and 1 (i.e. 0 % to 100 %). A score of 0.42 means „the model estimates a 42 % chance of real-world exploitation within 30 days“.

    Read in glossary
    87.9 %
    High — model estimates ≥ 50% chance of real-world exploitation within 30 days.
    EPSS percentile

    The EPSS percentile is the relative position of a vulnerability within all EPSS-scored CVEs, expressed as a value between 0 and 1. A percentile of 0.90 means „this CVE has a higher EPSS score than 90 % of all other scored CVEs“. Unlike the EPSS score, it is not a probability — but a positioning within a ranking.

    Read in glossary
    99.76
    Critical — this CVE ranks in the top fifth of all CVEs scored today (rank ≥ 80%).
    KEV status

    The KEV catalogue is a list maintained by the US authority CISA of vulnerabilities for which active exploitation in the wild has been confirmed. It answers not the question „how severe?“ but „is it already being attacked?“ — thereby sharply prioritising patching.

    Read in glossary
    Actively exploited
    Published
    In CISA KEV since

    The KEV catalogue is a list maintained by the US authority CISA of vulnerabilities for which active exploitation in the wild has been confirmed. It answers not the question „how severe?“ but „is it already being attacked?“ — thereby sharply prioritising patching.

    Read in glossary
    CWE

    CWE is a catalogue of typical weakness types in software and hardware — such as flawed input validation, unsafe memory handling or poor authentication. Where a CVE names a concrete vulnerability in a concrete product, a CWE describes the underlying class of defect.

    Read in glossary
    CWE-610

    Response and mitigation

    Why act now?

    Prioritisation rationale

    The flaw is network-reachable without authentication or user interaction and lets an attacker modify system files — an ideal, fully automatable entry point for ransomware operators. CISA explicitly flags known ransomware use; the Deadbolt campaign mass-scanned internet-exposed QNAP devices and encrypted their data, typically hitting SMBs, medical practices, law firms and branch offices running port-forwarded NAS boxes. Exploitation likelihood sits among the very highest of any CVE: treat every internet-reachable NAS with an unpatched Photo Station as critical and act immediately, while internal-only devices warrant high but schedulable priority in the next maintenance window.

    1. Runbook step 1

      Immediate response (0-24 h)

      • Inventory: Identify every QNAP NAS with Photo Station installed (check QTS version and Photo Station version in App Center). Prioritise devices whose web interface or Photo Station is reachable from the internet (port forwarding, UPnP, myQNAPcloud).
      • Kill internet exposure now: Remove perimeter port forwards to the QTS web UI and Photo Station (commonly 80/443/8080/8081 — confirm actual ports in the QTS config). Disable UPnP on both QTS and the router, and switch off myQNAPcloud remote access.
      • Patch: Update Photo Station to the fixed build for your QTS branch — QTS 5.0.1: Photo Station 6.1.2 or later; QTS 5.0.0/4.5.x: 6.0.22 or later; QTS 4.3.6: 5.7.18 or later; QTS 4.3.3: 5.4.15 or later; QTS 4.2.6: 5.2.14 or later. Bring QTS itself to the current release as well.
      • Remove the app where not needed: If Photo Station isn't in use, stop or uninstall it via App Center. QNAP positions QuMagie as the successor — check its exposure too.
      • Check for compromise before reconnecting: Look for a replaced login page (ransom note instead of the QTS login) and files with the .deadbolt extension. If found: disconnect the device, do not reboot or factory-reset (preserve evidence), and trigger your IR process and any NIS2 reporting obligations.
      • Secure backups: Verify offline/immutable backups of NAS data; validate snapshot integrity before relying on them for restore.

    2. Runbook step 2

      Mitigation layers

      • Network segmentation: Move NAS devices into a dedicated management/storage VLAN; allow web UI access only from admin networks via ACL. Remote access only through VPN with MFA — never via direct port exposure.
      • Perimeter firewall: Explicitly drop inbound internet traffic to all NAS IPs (deny rule ahead of any NAT rules). Restrict NAS egress to required destinations (update servers, NTP, backup target).
      • WAF/reverse proxy: If Photo Station must be published externally, front it with an authenticating reverse proxy (pre-auth via SSO/MFA), allow /photo/ paths only for authenticated sessions, and block path-manipulation patterns (../, %2e%2e, absolute system paths in parameters).
      • Device hardening: Run QTS Security Counselor, keep Malware Remover updated and scheduled, enable automatic app and firmware updates, disable unused services (Web Server, multimedia apps, SSH/Telnet), and disable the default admin account.
      • Snapshot protection: Enable scheduled snapshots with a retention policy and restrict snapshot deletion to a separate admin account to limit encryption blast radius.

    3. Runbook step 3

      Detection rules

      • Perimeter telemetry (Zeek/Suricata/firewall logs): Any inbound internet connection to NAS IPs on web ports is a policy violation. Example KQL: CommonSecurityLog | where DestinationIP in (nas_ips) and DestinationPort in (80,443,8080,8081) and not(ipv4_is_private(SourceIP))
      • HTTP request patterns: In Zeek http.log or proxy logs, flag external requests to /photo/ with unusual parameters, traversal sequences or uploads. Sigma shape: uri|contains: '/photo/' AND uri|contains: ['../','%2e%2e','/etc/','/home/httpd/'].
      • On-device filesystem indicators: Bulk appearance of .deadbolt files, modifications to the login/index page in the web root, new or altered crontab entries, executables in /tmp or hidden directories. Set up periodic integrity checks (hash comparison of web UI files) via script or monitoring.
      • Behavioural anomalies: Sudden spikes in NAS write I/O or CPU (SNMP/syslog), client errors opening shares, backup jobs failing due to mass file changes.
      • Forward QTS system logs to the SIEM via syslog: Alert on unexpected app installs, configuration changes, disabled snapshots or newly created admin accounts.

    Detection rules

    No NEOSEC detection rule is available for this vulnerability yet.

    Classification under NIS2 and CRA

    Rule-based classification from exploitation status and severity. It does not replace a case-by-case assessment.

    NIS2

    NIS2 is EU Directive (EU) 2022/2555 to raise the level of cybersecurity across the Union. It substantially broadens obligations compared with the first NIS directive: more sectors, mandatory risk management, staged reporting duties and personal accountability of senior management.

    Read in glossary
    Actively exploited: treat the vulnerability as a priority in vulnerability handling under Art. 21(2)(e) NIS2. If it is exploited in your environment, check the reporting obligation under Art. 23 (early warning within 24 hours).
    CRA

    The CRA is EU Regulation (EU) 2024/2847 setting horizontal cybersecurity requirements for „products with digital elements“ — from industrial controllers and software to connected consumer devices. For the first time manufacturers must ensure security across the entire product lifecycle, handle vulnerabilities and provide security updates.

    Read in glossary
    Since 11.09.2026, manufacturers of affected products with digital elements must report actively exploited vulnerabilities under Art. 14 CRA, with an early warning within 24 hours via ENISA's single reporting platform.
    ISO/IEC 27001

    ISO/IEC 27001 is the internationally leading standard for an information security management system (ISMS). It describes a risk-based, process-oriented framework to systematically plan, implement, review and improve information security.

    Read in glossary
    Control A.8.8, management of technical vulnerabilities: assess relevance to your systems, plan remediation and keep evidence.

    Description

    An externally controlled reference to a resource vulnerability has been reported to affect QNAP NAS running Photo Station. If exploited, This could allow an attacker to modify system files. We have already fixed the vulnerability in the following versions: QTS 5.0.1: Photo Station 6.1.2 and later QTS 5.0.0/4.5.x: Photo Station 6.0.22 and later QTS 4.3.6: Photo Station 5.7.18 and later QTS 4.3.3: Photo Station 5.4.15 and later QTS 4.2.6: Photo Station 5.2.14 and later

    Source: NVD (NIST), cvelistv5, CISA KEV Catalog, CVE.org (MITRE)

    Affected products

    The following versions are affected. Older releases of the same product line are also vulnerable unless stated otherwise.

    Affected products
    Affected versionsFixed in
    QNAP Systems Inc.Photo Station
    • < 6.1.2
    • < 5.4.15
    • < 5.7.18
    • < 6.0.22
    • < 5.2.14
    • 6.1.2
    • 5.4.15
    • 5.7.18
    • 6.0.22
    • 5.2.14
    qnapphoto_station
    • < 5.2.14
    • < 5.4.15
    • < 5.7.18
    • < 6.0.22
    • < 6.1.2
    • 5.2.14
    • 5.4.15
    • 5.7.18
    • 6.0.22
    • 6.1.2

    Vendors and products

    Weakness classes (CWE)

    • CWE-610Externally Controlled Reference to a Resource in Another Sphere

      Class

      The product uses an externally controlled name or reference that resolves to a resource that is outside of the intended control sphere.

      Entry at MITRE CWE-610

    Public exploit references

    Publicly reported proof-of-concepts, exploit modules and detection templates for this vulnerability. NEOSEC links to the original sources only and does not provide any exploit code.

    Public exploit references
    CISA KEV CatalogCISA Known Exploited Vulnerability (opens in a new tab)cisa.govactively exploited

    References & sources

    • qnap.comen/security-advisory/qsa-22-24x_refsource_MISC, Vendor advisory
    • cisa.govknown-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog?field_cve=CVE-2022-27593government-resource, US government resource
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