CVE-1999-0168
Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.
NVD · uneditedThe portmapper may act as a proxy and redirect service requests from an attacker, making the request appear to come from the local host, possibly bypassing authentication that would otherwise have taken place. For example, NFS file systems could be mounted through the portmapper despite export restrictions.
Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.
dbcve analysis · high confidenceThe RPC portmapper service (port 111) can act as a proxy, redirecting service requests and making them appear to originate from the local host. This allows attackers to bypass IP-based authentication and access controls, potentially mounting NFS filesystems or accessing other RPC services despite export restrictions or firewall rules.
Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.
Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.
NVD · CPE data= 4.1.3= 4.1.3cCVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.
From the vector- Attack vector
- Network
- Complexity
- Low
- Authentication
- None
- Confidentiality
- Partial
- Integrity
- Partial
- Availability
- Partial
AV:N/AC:L/Au:N/C:P/I:P/A:P
Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.
dbcve checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Check if portmapper is listening on port 111Run 'rpcinfo -p' or 'netstat -an | grep 111' or 'ss -lntp | grep 111' to see if the portmapper RPC service is registered and listeningAffected if Portmapper is actively running and listening on TCP/UDP port 111
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Verify the operating system versionRun 'uname -a' or 'cat /etc/release' to identify the exact SunOS versionAffected if The system is running Sun SunOS 4.1.3 or 4.1.3c specifically
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Confirm RPC services are registered with portmapperRun 'rpcinfo -p' to list all RPC services registered with the portmapperAffected if Any RPC services (such as NFS, mountd, ypbind) are registered and accessible through the portmapper
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Test external accessibility of port 111Use a scanner or 'nmap -p 111 target' from an external or untrusted network perspective to see if port 111 is reachableAffected if Port 111 is accessible from network segments that should not have RPC access
You are affected if you are running Sun SunOS 4.1.3 or 4.1.3c with the portmapper service enabled and port 111 is accessible to untrusted networks, allowing proxy attacks to bypass IP-based restrictions.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.
From vendor dataRestrict access to the portmapper service at network borders using firewall rules, or disable the portmapper if RPC services are not required. Monitor for suspicious portmapper activity and implement IP-based access controls on exposed RPC services.
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation4.0 h
- Testing2.0 h
- Review / QA1.0 h
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Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-1999-0168 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-1999-0168 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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