Rt Ac86u FirmwareOperating system · Asus

CVE-2023-39237

HIGH · 8.8 CVSS v3.1 Published 2023-09-07
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
94/100
Remediation priority · Urgent
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
ASUS RT-AC86U Traffic Analyzer - Apps analysis function has insufficient filtering of special character. A remote attacker with regular user privilege can exploit this vulnerability to perform command injection attack to execute arbitrary commands, disrupt system or terminate services.

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 confidence

Command injection vulnerability in ASUS RT-AC86U router's Traffic Analyzer Apps analysis function due to insufficient filtering of special characters. A remote attacker with regular user privileges can inject arbitrary commands through the Apps analysis feature, bypassing the need for administrator access.

MitigationApply the latest ASUS firmware update for RT-AC86U. If no update is available, disable the Traffic Analyzer feature and ensure the router's management interface is not exposed to untrusted networks.

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
Rt Ac86u FirmwareOperating system
Affected:= 3.0.0.4_386_51529

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
High
Integrity
High
Availability
High

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:L/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 checks

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

  1. Identify router model
    Access router web interface or check device label to confirm model is RT-AC86U
    Affected if Router model is not RT-AC86U (different models may have different vulnerabilities)
  2. Check firmware version
    Navigate to router web interface > Administration > Firmware Version, or log into router via SSH and run 'nvram get firmware_version' or check /etc/version
    Affected if Firmware version is 3.0.0.4_386_51529 exactly (the specific affected version)
  3. Determine if Traffic Analyzer is enabled
    Log into router web interface > Traffic Analyzer > Statistics, or check via SSH with 'nvram get apps_analysis_enable' (value of 1 indicates enabled)
    Affected if Traffic Analyzer feature is enabled and running on the router
  4. Check router management interface exposure
    Review router firewall settings and port forwards to determine if web management interface (port 80/443) is accessible from WAN/internet, or run 'iptables -L -n' via SSH to inspect firewall rules
    Affected if Management interface is exposed to untrusted networks (internet-accessible)

User is affected if they have an RT-AC86U router running firmware version 3.0.0.4_386_51529 with Traffic Analyzer enabled and potentially exposed to network access beyond the local trusted network.

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

Apply the latest ASUS firmware update for RT-AC86U. If no update is available, disable the Traffic Analyzer feature and ensure the router's management interface is not exposed to untrusted networks.

Fix this in Rt Ac86u Firmware Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation2.0 h
  • Implementation2.0 h
  • Testing2.0 h
  • Review / QA1.0 h
7.0 hours of engineering $1,240
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Scan for this in your stack

Free · runs locally
dbcve dependency scanner

Check whether your project pulls in CVE-2023-39237 — 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 sources

Practitioner notes

Contributed

Peer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2023-39237 in production — separate from our analysis above.

No notes yet

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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
  • 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