EmuiOperating system · Huawei

CVE-2023-39394

HIGH · 7.5 CVSS v3.1 Published 2023-08-13
Mitigation only
No fix yet — a mitigation exists. There is no fixed release. A documented workaround reduces exposure in the meantime.
See remediation →
84/100
Remediation priority · High
Remotely reachable No privileges 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
Vulnerability of API privilege escalation in the wifienhance module. Successful exploitation of this vulnerability may cause the arp list to be modified.

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

This is a privilege escalation vulnerability in the wifienhance module's API that allows a lower-privileged user to access functions that should be restricted to higher privilege levels. The specific impact is modification of the ARP (Address Resolution Protocol) list, which could allow an attacker to manipulate network mapping and potentially perform man-in-the-middle attacks.

MitigationApply vendor-supplied patches for the wifienhance module and implement proper API authorization checks to enforce privilege boundaries. Network segmentation can limit the impact of ARP manipulation attacks.

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
EmuiOperating system
Affected:= 12.0.1= 13.0.0
HarmonyosOperating system
Affected:= 2.0.1= 3.0.0= 3.1.0

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

CVSS:3.1/AV:N/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:U/C:N/I:H/A:N

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. Check the installed Emui or Harmonyos version
    Go to Settings > About Phone on the Huawei device and note the EMUI version number (e.g., 12.0.1, 13.0.0) or HarmonyOS version number (e.g., 2.0.1, 3.0.0, 3.1.0)
    Affected if The device is running EMUI 12.0.1, EMUI 13.0.0, HarmonyOS 2.0.1, HarmonyOS 3.0.0, or HarmonyOS 3.1.0 exactly as listed in the affected versions
  2. Verify the wifienhance module is present
    Check system settings or use a device inspection tool to confirm the wifienhance module is installed on the device (typically found under Settings > Apps or in system app listings)
    Affected if The wifienhance module exists on the device, which is required for the vulnerability to be exploitable
  3. Confirm network API access is available
    Check if the device exposes network-related API endpoints or developer options that allow third-party apps to interact with the wifienhance module's ARP manipulation functions
    Affected if The wifienhance API is accessible to lower-privileged applications without proper authorization checks
  4. Review ARP table for unauthorized modifications
    Monitor the device's ARP table using command line tools (e.g., ip neigh show or arp -a if available) or through a network monitoring application to detect unexpected ARP entries or changes
    Affected if Unexpected or unauthorized ARP entries appear in the table, indicating potential exploitation of the ARP list modification functionality

A user is affected if their Huawei device runs one of the listed exact EMUI or HarmonyOS versions and contains the wifienhance module with its vulnerable API accessible to lower-privileged users.

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 vendor-supplied patches for the wifienhance module and implement proper API authorization checks to enforce privilege boundaries. Network segmentation can limit the impact of ARP manipulation attacks.

Fix this in Emui Scoped from the published advisory
  • Consultation2.0 h
  • Implementation8.0 h
  • Testing4.0 h
  • Review / QA2.0 h
16.0 hours of engineering $2,800
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Scan for this in your stack

Free · runs locally
dbcve dependency scanner

Check whether your project pulls in CVE-2023-39394 — 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-2023-39394 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