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Webcenter InteractionApplication · Oracle

CVE-2018-16956

MEDIUM · 6.5 CVSS v3.0 Published 2018-09-18
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
71/100
Remediation priority · Elevated
Remotely reachable Zero-click

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 · unedited
The AjaxControl component of Oracle WebCenter Interaction Portal 10.3.3 does not validate the names of pages when processing page rename requests. Pages can be renamed to include characters unsupported for URIs by the web server hosting the WCI Portal software (such as IIS). Renaming pages to include unsupported characters, such as 0x7f, prevents these pages from being accessed over the web server, causing a Denial of Service (DoS) to the page. NOTE: this CVE is assigned by MITRE and isn't validated by Oracle because Oracle WebCenter Interaction Portal is out of support.

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 confidence

The AjaxControl component in Oracle WebCenter Interaction Portal 10.3.3 lacks input validation on page rename requests, allowing pages to be renamed with URI-unsupported characters (such as 0x7f). When pages contain these characters, the web server (IIS) cannot serve them, resulting in a denial of service for the affected pages.

MitigationSince Oracle WCI Portal is end-of-life with no vendor patch available, implement custom input validation at the application or web server (IIS) level to reject page names containing URI-invalid characters, or disable the vulnerable page rename functionality in AjaxControl.

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
Webcenter InteractionApplication
Affected:= 10.3.3

CVSS 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
Low
User interaction
None
Scope
Unchanged
Confidentiality
None
Integrity
None
Availability
High

CVSS:3.0/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:N/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 checks

Work through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.

  1. Confirm Oracle WebCenter Interaction version
    Check the installed version of Oracle WebCenter Interaction Portal. This is typically visible in the portal's About page, installation directory, or Windows Add/Remove Programs. Look for version 10.3.3 specifically.
    Affected if The installed version is exactly 10.3.3
  2. Verify AjaxControl component is accessible
    Check if the AjaxControl functionality is enabled and accessible in the portal. This component handles page operations including rename. Look for the /ajaxControl endpoint or similar paths in the web application.
    Affected if AjaxControl is enabled and accessible in the portal
  3. Inspect existing portal page names for invalid URI characters
    Review all page names in the portal for the presence of URI-invalid characters, specifically looking for characters like 0x7f (DEL character) or other non-printable/non-standard characters. Access the portal's page management interface or query the backend database storing page metadata.
    Affected if Any portal page names contain URI-unsupported characters such as 0x7f or other non-standard characters
  4. Check IIS logs for page serving failures
    Examine IIS web server logs (typically in C:\inetpub\logs\LogFiles) for errors related to serving portal pages. Look for 400 Bad Request errors or similar HTTP errors indicating URL/URI parsing failures when accessing certain pages.
    Affected if IIS logs show failures serving specific portal pages due to URI-invalid characters in page URLs

You are affected if running Oracle WebCenter Interaction 10.3.3 with AjaxControl enabled and any portal pages contain or are named with URI-unsupported characters like 0x7f.

Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.

Check your environment

Paste your version and any relevant configuration and it will be compared against the affected criteria above. Do not include secrets or credentials.

AI-assisted, checked against the advisory. Informational, not a guarantee.

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 data
Mitigation available No clean upgrade yet — mitigate in the meantime
Mitigation

Since Oracle WCI Portal is end-of-life with no vendor patch available, implement custom input validation at the application or web server (IIS) level to reject page names containing URI-invalid characters, or disable the vulnerable page rename functionality in AjaxControl.

Fix this in Webcenter Interaction Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation4.0 h
  • Implementation8.0 h
  • Testing4.0 h
  • Review / QA2.0 h
18.0 hours of engineering $3,200
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References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.

Primary sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2018-16956 in production — separate from our analysis above.

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What this is

A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.

What belongs here
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  • Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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