SonicWall SMA100 Directory Traversal Vulnerability (CVE-2019-7483)
Published In CISA KEV since Sources: CVE.org
What is affected, what to do
In SonicWall SMA100, an unauthenticated Directory Traversal vulnerability in the handleWAFRedirect CGI allows the user to test for the presence of a file on the server.
The vulnerability is being actively exploited; treat it as a priority. The available sources name no fixed version. Check the vendor guidance in the references below. Immediate actions, mitigation and detection rules are in the runbook below.
- Affected
- SonicWall SMA100
eq 9.0.0.3 and earlier..9.0.0.3 and earlier
- SonicWall SMA100
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Metrics
7.5
Priority
XIEM Effective CVSS: highest available CVSS rating from NVD and vendor data.
Source: NVD, CVSS v3
7.5
CVSS v3
Severity High on the scale from 0 to 10.
Source: CVE.org
4.0 %
EPSS score
Moderate — model estimates 1-10% exploitation likelihood.
Source: FIRST EPSS, percentile 90.6
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- 203.09 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- 7.5 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- 7.5
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- 4.0 %
- Moderate — model estimates 1-10% exploitation likelihood.
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- 90.6
- 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- CISA assessment (SSVC)
- Exploitation: active · automatable · Technical impact: partial
- Source: CISA Vulnrichment, as of 6 February 2025
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-22
Response and mitigation
Why act now?
Prioritisation rationale
This CVE is on KEV because attackers use it as a low-noise reconnaissance primitive against SMA100 appliances: before launching their actual exploit (typically credential attacks or follow-on RCE chains on the same platform), they map the file layout and patch state of the target. The CVSS vector describes a network-reachable, unauthenticated information-disclosure flaw with high confidentiality impact, and the EPSS likelihood puts it clearly in the elevated band. Rate it HIGH for any externally reachable SMA100 — SonicWall SSL-VPN appliances are a recurring target of ransomware-affiliated initial-access brokers, even though CISA has not flagged this specific CVE for ransomware use. Internally segmented appliances or those verified at 9.0.0.4+ can be downgraded to MEDIUM after confirmation.
Runbook step 1
Immediate response (0-24 h)
- Inventory all SonicWall SMA100 appliances (SMA 200, 210, 400, 410, 500v). Any device on firmware 9.0.0.3 or earlier must be upgraded to at least 9.0.0.4 or the current vendor-approved 9.x/10.x release (SonicWall PSIRT SNWLID-2019-0009).
- If immediate patching is not feasible, restrict external exposure of the management and SSL-VPN portal (TCP/443, TCP/8443) at the perimeter firewall to trusted source IPs only (admin jump hosts, known partner ranges).
- Retro-hunt the appliance access logs (/var/log, WebCGI logs) going back 24 months for requests to
/cgi-bin/handleWAFRedirectcontaining../patterns. On any hit, open an incident and rotate all local admin and VPN credentials. - Confirm whether the appliance is end-of-support (SMA 200/400 are EoS). EoS hardware cannot be patched and must be replaced with supported platforms (SMA 210/410/500v) or decommissioned.
- Prepare a change window and rollback plan: SonicWall firmware updates require a reboot; roll HA pairs sequentially and schedule standalone units into maintenance windows.
Runbook step 2
Mitigation layers
- Network segmentation: force the SMA100 management interface into a dedicated management VLAN, reachable only via bastion or PAM — never direct from the internet.
- Place a WAF or reverse proxy in front of the portal: block and alert on requests to
/cgi-bin/handleWAFRedirectwhose parameters contain..,%2e%2e,%252e,/etc/,/proc/or backslash encodings. - Enable IPS rules (Suricata/Snort) covering path-traversal signatures against SonicWall SMA URIs; keep Emerging Threats community rules and SonicWall's own Security Services module current.
- Appliance hardening: disable unused portals, remove unused Virtual Offices, rename the default admin, enforce MFA for every administrative login.
- Egress control: restrict outbound traffic from the appliance to the services it actually needs (NTP, DNS, licence server, Syslog collector) to blunt data-exfiltration attempts.
- Back up the appliance configuration before every firmware upgrade; store encrypted off-box so that in a compromise scenario a trusted baseline exists.
Runbook step 3
Detection rules
- Web access log pattern on the SMA or upstream reverse proxy:
GET /cgi-bin/handleWAFRedirect?.*(\.\./|%2e%2e|%252e)— treat every hit as high-severity, including HTTP 404 responses (the whole point of this bug is distinguishing 200 vs. 404 to enumerate files). - Sigma shape (web category):
selection: cs-uri-stem endswith 'handleWAFRedirect' AND cs-uri-query contains any ('..', '%2e%2e', '/etc/passwd', '/etc/shadow')→ alert. - Zeek/Suricata: HTTP events whose
urimatches handleWAFRedirect and contains traversal sequences; enrich with source-IP reputation (TOR exits, VPN ranges, known scanner ASNs). - Volumetric baseline: an unusually high count of 404 responses from a single client against CGI paths within a short window indicates file enumeration. KQL/SPL:
summarize count() by SourceIP, bin(TimeGenerated, 5m) | where count_ > 50. - Follow-up chain: successful enumeration is frequently followed by exploitation of CVE-2021-20016 (SQLi) or CVE-2021-20038 (RCE) on the same appliance — build a correlation that links handleWAFRedirect probing with subsequent POSTs to
/__api__/or/fileshare/.
- Web access log pattern on the SMA or upstream reverse proxy:
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
In SonicWall SMA100, an unauthenticated Directory Traversal vulnerability in the handleWAFRedirect CGI allows the user to test for the presence of a file on the server.
Source: NVD (NIST), cvelistv5, CISA KEV Catalog
Affected products
The following versions are affected. Older releases of the same product line are also vulnerable unless stated otherwise.
| Affected versions | Fixed in | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| SonicWall | SMA100 |
|
|
Vendors and products
Affected operating systems
| Other | sonicwall | sma_100_firmware | — |
Weakness classes (CWE)
CWE-22Improper Limitation of a Pathname to a Restricted Directory ('Path Traversal')
Base
The product uses external input to construct a pathname that is intended to identify a file or directory that is located underneath a restricted parent directory, but the product does not properly neutralize special elements within the pathname that can cause the pathname to resolve to a location that is outside of the restricted directory.
Entry at MITRE CWE-22
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.
| CISA KEV Catalog | CISA Known Exploited Vulnerability (opens in a new tab)cisa.gov | actively exploited |
References & sources
- psirt.global.sonicwall.comvuln-detail/SNWLID-2019-0018x_refsource_CONFIRM, Vendor advisory
- cisa.govknown-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog?field_cve=CVE-2019-7483government-resource, US government resource
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<a href="https://intel.neosec.eu/en/cve/CVE-2019-7483"><img src="https://intel.neosec.eu/badge/cve/CVE-2019-7483.svg?lang=en" alt="CVE-2019-7483 – NEOSEC Intel" height="20"></a>