CVE-2016-5879
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 · uneditedMQCLI on IBM MQ Appliance M2000 and M2001 devices allows local users to execute arbitrary shell commands via a crafted (1) Disaster Recovery or (2) High Availability command.
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 · moderate confidenceMQCLI on IBM MQ Appliance M2000 and M2001 devices contains a local command injection vulnerability allowing authenticated local users to execute arbitrary shell commands via crafted Disaster Recovery or High Availability commands. This represents a local privilege escalation issue where the CLI fails to properly sanitize input when processing these specific commands.
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= 8.0CVSS 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
- Local
- Complexity
- Low
- Privileges
- Low
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- Changed
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:C/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 IBM MQ Appliance modelRun 'show hardware' or check the physical label to confirm the model is M2000 or M2001Affected if The model is M2000 or M2001 and the firmware is version 8.0
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Check the installed firmware versionRun 'show version' or access the appliance admin console to view the firmware versionAffected if The firmware version is exactly 8.0 (all patches of 8.0 are affected)
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Confirm MQCLI is accessibleAttempt to access the MQCLI command interface via the appliance console or SSH. Run 'mqcli' or check if the command is available to authenticated usersAffected if MQCLI is accessible to local users with console or SSH access
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Review local user accounts with CLI accessRun 'show user' or check the appliance user management to list all local users with CLI privilegesAffected if There are local users configured with access to the CLI (any local user could potentially exploit this flaw)
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Inspect CLI audit logs for DR/HA commandsCheck appliance logs for commands related to Disaster Recovery or High Availability, such as 'mqcli dr*' or 'mqcli ha*' commands. Look in /var/mqm/logs/ or the appliance audit logAffected if There are logs of Disaster Recovery or High Availability commands being executed, indicating the vulnerable code path was reached
You are affected if you are running an IBM MQ Appliance M2000 or M2001 with firmware version 8.0 and have local users with CLI access, as the vulnerability allows any authenticated local user to inject commands through DR or HA subcommands in MQCLI.
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 physical and console access to trusted personnel only. Apply IBM patches when available. If patches are unavailable, consider network isolation of the appliance and monitoring for suspicious CLI activity. Review and minimize local user privileges to the lowest necessary level.
- Consultation3.0 h
- Implementation4.0 h
- Testing3.0 h
- Review / QA2.0 h
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Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2016-5879 — 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-2016-5879 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
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