CVE-2015-3656
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 · uneditedAruba Networks ClearPass Policy Manager before 6.4.7 and 6.5.x before 6.5.2 allows remote authenticated lower-level administrators to gain privileges by leveraging failure to properly enforce authorization checks.
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 confidenceAruba ClearPass Policy Manager versions before 6.4.7 and 6.5.x before 6.5.2 contain an authorization flaw where lower-level authenticated administrators can escalate privileges by bypassing role-based access control checks, allowing them to perform actions reserved for higher-privileged administrators.
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<= 6.4.6= 6.5= 6.5.1CVSS 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
- Privileges
- High
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:H/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
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 the installed ClearPass Policy Manager versionLog into the ClearPass Policy Manager admin interface and navigate to Administration > About, or run 'show version' via CLI to retrieve the exact software version number.Affected if The installed version is 6.4.6 or earlier, or exactly 6.5.0 or 6.5.1.
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Confirm multiple administrator roles existNavigate to Administration > User Manager > Roles in the ClearPass admin UI to list all defined administrative roles and their permission levels.Affected if The system has more than one administrator role defined, including roles with limited privileges.
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Verify lower-privileged admin accounts are presentCheck Administration > User Manager > Administrators to enumerate admin accounts and identify which accounts are assigned to lower-privileged roles (such as 'Operator' or 'Helpdesk').Affected if There are authenticated administrator accounts assigned to roles other than the highest-privilege administrator role.
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Check for recent administrative actions outside assigned role permissionsReview the ClearPass audit logs at Administration > Audit Logs for entries showing administrative actions performed by lower-privileged accounts that should be restricted to higher-privileged roles.Affected if Audit logs show actions performed by lower-privileged administrators that are reserved for Super Administrator or other higher-privilege roles.
You are affected if your ClearPass Policy Manager version is 6.4.6 or earlier, or 6.5.0/6.5.1, AND you have multiple administrator role levels with lower-privileged accounts present in the system.
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 dataUpgrade ClearPass Policy Manager to version 6.4.7 or 6.5.2 or later to obtain the patched authorization enforcement. If immediate upgrade is not feasible, restrict administrative access to trusted personnel and monitor for unauthorized privilege escalation attempts.
- Consultation4.0 h
- Implementation8.0 h
- Testing6.0 h
- Review / QA4.0 h
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Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2015-3656 — 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-2015-3656 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
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