CVE-2025-41378
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 · uneditedThe SSID field is not parsed correctly and can be used to inject commands into the hostpad.conf file. This can be exploited by an attacker to extend his knowledge of the system and compromise other devices. The information is filtered by the logs function of the web panel.
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 confidenceThis is a command injection vulnerability in wireless access point firmware where the SSID field input is not properly validated before being written to the hostpad.conf configuration file. An attacker can embed malicious commands within the SSID field that get executed when the configuration is processed, potentially allowing privilege escalation and lateral movement to compromise other devices on the network.
Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.
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
- Adjacent
- Complexity
- Low
- Privileges
- Low
- Authentication
- X
- User interaction
- None
- Scope
- X
CVSS:4.0/AV:A/AC:L/AT:N/PR:L/UI:N/VC:H/VI:N/VA:N/SC:N/SI:N/SA:N/E:X/CR:X/IR:X/AR:X/MAV:X/MAC:X/MAT:X/MPR:X/MUI:X/MVC:X/MVI:X/MVA:X/MSC:X/MSI:X/MSA:X/S:X/AU:X/R:X/V:X/RE:X/U:X
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 if the device runs hostapd-based wireless firmwareLocate the hostapd.conf or hostapd configuration file on the system, typically found in /etc/hostapd.conf, /etc/config/wireless, or within the device's firmware filesystemAffected if The device is a wireless access point and uses hostapd for Wi-Fi functionality
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Locate and inspect the SSID configuration entryRead the hostapd.conf file and find the 'ssid=' parameter line that defines the wireless network nameAffected if An SSID parameter exists in the configuration file
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Check for shell metacharacters in the SSID valueExamine the SSID value for presence of characters such as backticks ($), semicolons (;), pipes (|), quotes (' or "), backslashes (\), or command substitution syntax that could indicate injectionAffected if The SSID field contains any shell metacharacters or suspicious patterns that were not intentionally configured
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Verify how the SSID is configuredDetermine whether the SSID is set via a web interface, CLI, or configuration file, and check if user input is directly written to hostapd.conf without sanitizationAffected if SSID configuration accepts direct user input without apparent input validation before writing to hostapd.conf
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Audit configuration file permissions and ownershipCheck if the hostapd.conf file is owned by a privileged user and has restrictive permissions, and verify if the process writing to it runs with elevated privilegesAffected if The configuration file is writable by low-privilege users or the SSID input process runs as root without validation
A user is affected if their wireless access point firmware uses hostapd and the SSID configuration contains shell metacharacters or was written directly from unvalidated user input to hostapd.conf.
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 dataImplement strict input validation and sanitization for the SSID field, ensuring special characters are properly escaped or rejected before写入hostpad.conf. Apply principle of least privilege to the configuration generation process.
- Consultation3.0 h
- Implementation6.0 h
- Testing4.0 h
- Review / QA2.0 h
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Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2025-41378 — 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-2025-41378 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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- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
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