CVE-2013-3499
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 · uneditedGroundWork Monitor Enterprise 6.7.0 performs authentication on the basis of the HTTP Referer header, which allows remote attackers to obtain administrative privileges or access files via a crafted header.
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 confidenceGroundWork Monitor Enterprise 6.7.0 validates users based on the HTTP Referer header rather than proper credential-based authentication. Attackers can craft HTTP requests with a malicious Referer header to bypass authentication and gain administrative access or read arbitrary files on the system.
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= 6.7.0CVSS 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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Identify GroundWork Monitor installation versionLocate the GroundWork Monitor installation and determine the installed version number (commonly found in product documentation, about page, or version configuration files)Affected if The installed version is exactly 6.7.0
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Verify web interface accessibilityAccess the GroundWork Monitor web application HTTP/HTTPS endpointsAffected if The web interface is accessible and responds to requests
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Test Referer-based authentication behaviorSend an HTTP request to administrative endpoints with a crafted Referer header pointing to an authorized domain, without providing valid credentialsAffected if The application grants access or responds differently than it would to an unauthenticated request without the Referer header, indicating Referer validation is being used for authentication decisions
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Check authentication mechanism configurationExamine the web server or application configuration files for authentication settings, looking for any rules that evaluate the Referer header as a factor in granting accessAffected if Configuration files contain rules that rely on Referer header validation for authentication rather than standard credential or session-based checks
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Confirm administrative endpoint access methodAttempt to access administrative functions or restricted resources with and without a manipulated Referer header, comparing the authentication outcomesAffected if The presence of a specific Referer header alone determines whether access is granted to protected resources
A system is affected if it runs GroundWork Monitor version 6.7.0 and uses Referer header validation as a substitute for proper credential-based authentication.
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 dataReplace Referer-based authentication with proper session-based authentication using standard credential validation. Ensure all administrative endpoints require valid authenticated sessions.
- Consultation4.0 h
- Implementation8.0 h
- Testing4.0 h
- Review / QA4.0 h
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Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2013-3499 — 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-2013-3499 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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- Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
- No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
- No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data