Pulse Connect Secure Code Injection Vulnerability (CVE-2020-8218)
Published In CISA KEV since Sources: CVE.org
What is affected, what to do
A code injection vulnerability exists in Pulse Connect Secure <9.1R8 that allows an attacker to crafted a URI to perform an arbitrary code execution via the admin web interface.
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
- Pulse Connect Secure
eq Fixed in 9.1R8..Fixed in 9.1R8
- Pulse Connect Secure
Not sure whether and how you are affected? Ask a question about this vulnerability
Metrics
7.2
Priority
XIEM Effective CVSS: highest available CVSS rating from NVD and vendor data.
Source: NVD, CVSS v3
7.2
CVSS v3
Severity High on the scale from 0 to 10.
Source: CVE.org
32.3 %
EPSS score
Elevated — model estimates 10-50% exploitation likelihood.
Source: FIRST EPSS, percentile 98.3
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- 213.33 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- 7.2 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- 7.2
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- 32.3 %
- Elevated — model estimates 10-50% 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- 98.3
- 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 · not automatable · Technical impact: total
- Source: CISA Vulnrichment, as of 4 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-94
Response and mitigation
Why act now?
Prioritisation rationale
CVE-2020-8218 requires authenticated admin access, but it sits on a classic perimeter device. Attackers typically chain it with previously stolen admin credentials, for example via file-read bugs in older Pulse releases or credential reuse. This turns admin access into full code execution, giving them persistence and visibility into every VPN session. Exploitation likelihood is very high, and CISA does not flag known ransomware use. Typical targets are organisations relying on SSL VPN remote access, including government, critical infrastructure operators and manufacturing. Treat it as critical with a 24 h deadline if the admin UI is internet-reachable or any 9.1 build below 9.1R8 is still running. Where admin access is strictly internal and MFA-protected, high priority within the next maintenance window is defensible.
Runbook step 1
Immediate response (0-24 h)
- Patch: Upgrade every Pulse Connect Secure / Ivanti Connect Secure appliance below 9.1R8 to at least 9.1R8. Because the 9.1 train is outdated, prefer moving straight to a currently supported Ivanti Connect Secure release. Confirm the target build in the vendor advisory.
- Inventory: Enumerate all appliances, including HA cluster members and virtual instances. Pull the running version from System > Maintenance > Platform and flag anything below 9.1R8 as critical.
- Lock down the admin UI: Immediately block internet access to
/dana-admin/. Allow administration only via the internal or dedicated management interface, and disable admin access on the external port 443. - Rotate admin credentials: Exploitation requires high privileges. Reset all local admin accounts, admin realm passwords and connected service accounts (LDAP/AD bind, RADIUS shared secrets). This is especially important if older, unpatched Pulse releases with known arbitrary-file-read flaws were ever exposed.
- Integrity check: Run the vendor's Integrity Checker Tool (ICT). If it reports anomalies, isolate the appliance and capture forensic images before any reboot or patching. Only then rebuild from a known-good configuration.
- Terminate sessions: Kill all active admin and user sessions, since a compromised appliance can harvest session cookies.
Runbook step 2
Mitigation layers
- Network segmentation: Put the management interface in a dedicated admin VLAN. Permit access only from a jump host or PAW zone. Enforce this with a perimeter rule equivalent to
deny any -> <VPN-appliance>:443 path /dana-admin/*from external sources. - WAF/reverse proxy: If a WAF fronts the appliance, block
/dana-admin/requests from non-allowlisted source IPs. Also drop admin-path URIs containing shell metacharacters (;,|,`,$(,%0a). - IAM / least privilege: Trim admin roles to the minimum and use read-only admin roles for operations staff. Enforce MFA on the admin realm and use named personal admin accounts instead of shared ones.
- Egress control: Allowlist outbound traffic from the appliance to required destinations only (DNS, NTP, AAA servers, update servers, syslog). This frustrates reverse shells and tool staging.
- Log resilience: Forward the admin access, event and user access logs to the SIEM via syslog. An attacker with root can tamper with on-box logs.
- Network segmentation: Put the management interface in a dedicated admin VLAN. Permit access only from a jump host or PAW zone. Enforce this with a perimeter rule equivalent to
Runbook step 3
Detection rules
- Admin web logs: Hunt for
/dana-admin/requests with unusual parameters or shell metacharacters. SPL example:index=pulse uri_path="/dana-admin/*" (uri_query="*%3B*" OR uri_query="*%7C*" OR uri_query="*%60*" OR uri_query="*$(*"). - Admin login anomalies: Detect successful admin logins from unknown source IPs, outside business hours or from external ranges. A suitable Sigma shape:
logsource: pulse_secure admin; selection: message|contains "Login succeeded" AND realm = "Admin Users"; filter: src_ip in admin_allowlist. - Network telemetry (Zeek/Suricata): Watch for new outbound connections from the appliance IP to non-allowlisted destinations, such as high ports, HTTP fetches of ELF binaries or long-lived TCP sessions. KQL example:
CommonSecurityLog | where SourceIP == "<PCS-IP>" and DestinationIP !in (allowlist). - Integrity drift: Alert on new or modified files reported by ICT, particularly altered Perl/CGI scripts or webshells in the web root. Also flag unexpected configuration changes in the admin log (
Admin modified ...). - Downstream activity: Investigate appliance service-account logons (Windows Event IDs 4624/4625, 4768/4769) originating from hosts other than the appliance, which indicates stolen credentials.
- Admin web logs: Hunt for
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
A code injection vulnerability exists in Pulse Connect Secure <9.1R8 that allows an attacker to crafted a URI to perform an arbitrary code execution via the admin web interface.
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 | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| — | Pulse Connect Secure |
|
|
| ivanti | connect_secure |
|
|
| ivanti | policy_secure |
|
|
| pulsesecure | pulse_policy_secure |
|
|
Vendors and products
Weakness classes (CWE)
CWE-94Improper Control of Generation of Code ('Code Injection')
Base
The product constructs all or part of a code segment using externally-influenced input from an upstream component, but it does not neutralize or incorrectly neutralizes special elements that could modify the syntax or behavior of the intended code segment.
Entry at MITRE CWE-94
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
- kb.pulsesecure.netarticles/Pulse_Security_Advisories/SA44516x_refsource_MISC, Vendor advisory
- gosecure.netblog/2020/11/13/forget-your-perimeter-part-2-four-vulnerabiliti…x_refsource_MISC, Exploit, Third-party advisory
- cisa.govknown-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog?field_cve=CVE-2020-8218government-resource, US government resource
Embed badge
Show the severity and KEV status of this vulnerability on your site – with a link back here. The image is updated hourly.
<a href="https://intel.neosec.eu/en/cve/CVE-2020-8218"><img src="https://intel.neosec.eu/badge/cve/CVE-2020-8218.svg?lang=en" alt="CVE-2020-8218 – NEOSEC Intel" height="20"></a>