Mitel MiVoice Connect Code Injection Vulnerability (CVE-2022-41223)
Published In CISA KEV since Sources: pwn.watch, CVE.org
What is affected, what to do
The Director database component of MiVoice Connect through 19.3 (22.22.6100.0) could allow an authenticated attacker to conduct a code-injection attack via crafted data due to insufficient restrictions on the database data type.
The vulnerability is being actively exploited; treat it as a priority. CISA lists it as used in ransomware campaigns. 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
- Mitel MiVoice Connect
lte *..22.22.6100.0
- Mitel MiVoice Connect
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Metrics
6.8
Priority
XIEM Effective CVSS: highest available CVSS rating from NVD and vendor data.
Source: NVD, CVSS v3
6.8
CVSS v3
Severity Medium on the scale from 0 to 10.
Source: pwn.watch, CVE.org
10.7 %
EPSS score
Elevated — model estimates 10-50% exploitation likelihood.
Source: FIRST EPSS, percentile 95.8
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- 234.13 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- 6.8 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- 6.8
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- 10.7 %
- 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- 95.8
- 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 28 January 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
The flaw can only be exploited from an adjacent network segment and requires high privileges, so its base severity looks moderate. In practice, though, Mitel VoIP appliances are a poorly monitored foothold inside the network: once an attacker has initial access and admin credentials, code execution in Director gives them full control over the system's confidentiality, integrity and availability. CISA lists it with confirmed ransomware campaign use, and its exploitation likelihood is well above that of the typical CVE. Organisations running MiVoice Connect should treat patching as high priority, especially where voice servers are unsegmented, lack EDR, or use shared Director accounts. If you run no Mitel products, you can close this item.
Runbook step 1
Immediate response (0-24 h)
- Inventory: Find every MiVoice Connect HQ and Distributed Voice Server that runs the Director component and check its build number. Per NVD, all versions up to and including 19.3 (22.22.6100.0) are affected.
- Patch: Upgrade to a build later than 19.3 (22.22.6100.0). A patch is available from the vendor — look up the exact fixed version in the Mitel product security advisory for CVE-2022-41223. Coordinate with your Mitel partner or telephony provider early, because voice maintenance windows are often contractually constrained.
- Restrict Director access: Lock the Director web interface (HTTPS) down to a dedicated admin subnet or jump hosts using host firewall rules or ACLs. Block every other internal VLAN, especially user and guest networks.
- Rotate credentials: Reset all Director administrator accounts and any service accounts with Director rights. Exploitation needs an authenticated, high-privilege session, so stolen or default credentials are the real entry point. Disable admin accounts that are not needed.
- Hunt for compromise: Check the voice servers for persistence: new services, scheduled tasks, webshells in the Director install path, and unknown local accounts. If you find anything, isolate the server and trigger incident response (and assess NIS2 reporting obligations).
Runbook step 2
Mitigation layers
- Network segmentation: Put voice infrastructure in its own VLAN or zone. Allow connections to Director only from the admin management network. Apply default-deny egress to the voice servers and explicitly allow only Mitel update endpoints and SIP trunk destinations.
- IAM / least privilege: Give Director administrators role-based profiles instead of full admin rights. Require unique, strong passwords and ban shared accounts. Enforce MFA in front of the admin subnet, for example through a VPN or PAM gateway.
- Endpoint hardening: Deploy EDR on the HQ server and enable application control (AppLocker/WDAC). The goal is that Director, web server and database processes cannot launch shells or LOLBins (
cmd.exe,powershell.exe,certutil.exe,rundll32.exe). - IPS / proxy: Put a logging reverse proxy in front of Director. Alert on suspicious input in database-bound fields, such as shell metacharacters, script fragments or unusually long values. Check whether your IPS vendor ships a signature for this CVE.
- Backup and recovery: Given the confirmed ransomware use, keep a tested, offline copy of the MiVoice configuration. Make sure telephony restoration, including emergency calling, is covered in the business-continuity plan.
Runbook step 3
Detection rules
- Process ancestry (Sysmon EID 1 / Windows 4688): Alert on child processes spawned by Director, web server or database processes on the HQ server. Sigma shape:
ParentImage|contains: ['\\Shoreline', '\\Mitel', 'w3wp.exe', 'mysqld'] AND Image|endswith: ['\\cmd.exe','\\powershell.exe','\\wscript.exe','\\certutil.exe']. - Director authentication: Flag Director admin logins from outside the admin subnet, logins outside business hours, and newly created admin users (Director audit log, proxy log). On the Windows host, watch 4624 (logon type 3/10) and 4720 (account created).
- File system (Sysmon EID 11): New
.php,.aspx,.exe,.dllor.ps1files under the Director or web root directories strongly suggest a webshell or dropped payload. - Network telemetry (Zeek/Suricata): Watch for outbound connections from the voice server to unknown public destinations, and for SMB/RDP from the voice server into other segments (lateral movement). KQL sketch:
DeviceNetworkEvents | where DeviceName in (MitelServers) and RemoteIPType == "Public" and RemoteUrl !in (AllowList). - Ransomware precursors: On the HQ server, look for shadow-copy deletion (
vssadmin delete shadows,wmic shadowcopy delete), tunnelling tools (e.g.chisel,plink), and mass file renames.
- Process ancestry (Sysmon EID 1 / Windows 4688): Alert on child processes spawned by Director, web server or database processes on the HQ server. Sigma shape:
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
The Director database component of MiVoice Connect through 19.3 (22.22.6100.0) could allow an authenticated attacker to conduct a code-injection attack via crafted data due to insufficient restrictions on the database data type.
Source: pwn.watch, 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 versions | Fixed in | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| mitel | mivoice_connect |
|
|
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
- mitel.comsupport/security-advisoriesVendor advisory
- mitel.comVendor advisory: Mitel MiVoice ConnectVendor advisory, pwn-watch
- cisa.govknown-exploited-vulnerabilities-catalog?field_cve=CVE-2022-41223government-resource, US government resource
- pwn.watchpwn.watch: Mitel MiVoice Connect: 2 exploited vulnerabilities (CVE-2022-40765, CVE-2022-41223)pwn-watch
- mitel.comVendor advisory: Mitel MiVoice Connectpwn-watch
- NVD (NIST)NVD: CVE-2022-40765pwn-watch
- NVD (NIST)NVD: CVE-2022-41223pwn-watch
- cisa.govCISA Known Exploited Vulnerabilities Catalogpwn-watch
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<a href="https://intel.neosec.eu/en/cve/CVE-2022-41223"><img src="https://intel.neosec.eu/badge/cve/CVE-2022-41223.svg?lang=en" alt="CVE-2022-41223 – NEOSEC Intel" height="20"></a>